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By Sabrina Singhapattanapong

Daily Bruin Reporter

ssinghapattanapong@media.ucla.edu

Up to 3,200 University of California lecturers may strike this fall if a new contract is not reached, said the University Council of the American Federation of Teachers.

After nearly two years of unsuccessful bargaining between the UC-AFT and university officials, UCLA lecturers’ contract negotiator Robert Hennig today will call on lecturers to form a strike steering committee at a meeting in the Faculty Center at 4 p.m.

The existing contract, which expired June 30, 2000 and is still in effect, fails to meet lecturers’ demands for greater job security, higher salaries and more funding for research and professional development, Hennig said.

Lecturers, who teach about 50 percent of the undergraduate population, are usually hired for a few years and then let go, he said.

The existing contract allows lecturers who have worked at least six years to seek possible employment for three more years, said Miki Goral, treasurer of the UC-AFT.

But departments can turn down lecturers’ requests for continued employment if there no longer exists a need for them, she added.

UC spokesman Paul Schwartz said the UC is committed to providing a constant flow of new ideas, people and perspective to students.

Lecturers are demanding that salary increases and performance-based pay systems be revised, according to the UC-AFT Web site.

Lecturers are entitled to two merit-based reviews in their career, but upon receiving a positive merit review, there is no requirement for pay increases based on those reviews, the Web site said.

While some graduate students receive reimbursements for their research or for attending professional conferences, UC lecturers do not receive funding for such professional development, Hennig said.

Though Hennig said a UC-wide strike may occur if lecturers’ demands are not met, the university feels that issues “don’t get resolved on the street corner; they get resolved on the bargaining table,” Schwartz said.

The UC presented an updated contract proposal to UC-AFT negotiators last week and are waiting for the union’s response.

“Our proposals continue to be sensitive to the union’s stated priorities,” Schwartz said.

Both parties will continue bargaining Friday.