Updates from the bargaining table: first day back in January
On Monday, your negotiating team was back at the table with UBC for the first time this year. We made good progress on several of our non-monetary proposals, and came to a tentative agreement with the employer on one of them. Read on below for a complete update of everything that happened at our first bargaining session in 2026:
Procedural Proposals:
Procedural 7: Above 1.0 TA Appointments
Status: Agreed to
We reached an agreement for a new Letter of Understanding regarding TA appointments above 1.0 (192 hours) over a term. Some members have raised concerns about how these appointments are allotted – in particular, there are concerns that favouritism or other biases may be at play here. Our proposed Letter of Understanding ensures that our union is informed about these positions and, if requested, rationale for them is provided.
Procedural 4: Job Postings and Procedural 6: Preference Continuation
Status: Awaiting formal reply
One aim of our proposals is to ensure that you can understand how many hours you have preference for in a given academic year and that you are able to get the hours you are entitled to, especially if hours were reduced due to working as a sessional instructor or because of budgetary constraints. To these ends, we have now proposed a standardized application form and offer letters for Teaching Assistant positions.
Equity Proposals:
Equity 2: Disciplinary Procedures:
Status: Awaiting formal reply
We have proposed a new article in the collective agreement that outlines the process and timelines that needs to be followed when a disciplinary meeting is held.
Equity 3: Information Regarding Deaths in the University Community and Bereavement Expansion
Status: Awaiting formal reply
Your negotiating team tabled new language that would ensure the University informs our Union about the death of someone in the UBC community who works with members of our bargaining unit and expanding our bereavement leave to include the case of the death of a close colleague.
UBC raised concerns that the process of informing people about the death of a member of the University community is already outlined in one of their HR policies and that new language to our bereavement leave would make it accessible to too many people. Your negotiating team remains committed to developing a clearer and more compassionate process for when members are impacted by the death of someone at UBC
Status: Preparing response
UBC proposed one sentence in Article B1 that refers to the Senate Policy around Academic Freedom in response to our proposal for a new article enshrining academic freedom in the CA. Not only is it crucial that we have more robust and detailed language around academic freedom in our agreement, just like the UBC Faculty Association has, but we want to ensure that members will not be disciplined for exercising the right to academic freedom.
Equity 6: The University Will Inform the Union About Increased Policing:
Status: Preparing response
This proposal speaks to the frequency of elevated police presence on campus, and seeks to protect members who may have a historically and/or personally informed issue with that presence. This was already agreed to in the past by UBC via labour management, but we want to make sure it is enshrined in the collective agreement.
Employer Proposals:
Employer LOU: Rescheduling of Exams:
Status: Awaiting formal reply
In their original proposal, UBC proposed a letter of understanding that would require people to perform ed work at a later date when the exam is rescheduled due to unforeseen circumstances. We have tabled a counter-proposal that would require that the hours needed for exam invigilation in these cases are taken from the term in which you are working, rather than the term in which the exam was supposed to occur.
Employer Non-Monetary 1: Information that the Employer Provides to the Union:
Status: Preparing response
UBC has presented a proposal that would remove certain requirements around the information that they must provide to our union. Specifically, they are seeking the removal of ‘Student Appointments by Name’ and ‘Student Appointments by Department’ from the list of reports provided to the Union in Article A4.01. This information is critical for your union to understand who is in our union and our workplaces.
Employer Non-Monetary 2: Departmental Reviews:
Status: Awaiting formal reply
The employer presented a proposal that would limit how frequently departmental reviews could occur over a given timespan. Departmental review is a current practice outlined in our collective agreement that allows our union to perform a review of a department’s appointment forms, job descriptions, offer letters, confirmation of any training/orientation completed, and allocation of hours forms (Article B 2.05). We do not believe these reviews have occurred frequently enough to necessitate this proposal from the employer, nor could we verify that certain reviews mentioned by the employer had taken place at all.
What’s next?
We will next meet with the employer at the bargaining table on February 2nd. In addition to the proposals awaiting a response that are laid out above, we are also expecting to hear a response from the employer on our proposals for the Centre for Accessibility’s Exam Invigilators that we originally discussed on December 3rd. We also plan to table our proposals related to improving undergraduate education.
We are also continuing to invite union stewards to participate in bargaining! Stewards have been sent an email with more information about how to join bargaining. A reminder that if you are interested in becoming a steward, steward elections will be held at the next Component 1 Membership Meeting on January 28, 2026 from 5:30pm-7:30pm. Check your email for details!