Faculty at Thompson Rivers University have voted to ratify a new collective agreement.
Mediator Mark Brown’s recommendations were approved by 91% of the 459 members who voted.
TRU Faculty Association President Tom Friedman says he suspected that faculty would have recognized that they were not going to do any better.
“Normally when you have a yes vote, especially of that magnitude, people are happy about the settlement but this wasn’t a settlement and I think people reluctantly voted yes.”
“It’s been a long and difficult process. I think people wanted to put it behind them.”
5% of the 5.5% total compensation increase over 5 years awarded to all British Columbia public sector employees will be equally distributed to all faculty, and the remainder will be allocated to contract faculty who are currently paid below the average of Canadian comparator universities.
A joint committee between the Faulty and Administration will also be established to examine workload.
Friedman says they will be looking to engage with the Administration in discussions of issues that were left unresolved which included needing full-time positions in bargaining rounds.
The TRU Faculty Association represents approximately 650 instructors, counselors, librarians, learning designers and career education coordinators at the Kamloops and Williams Lake campuses.
Their new collective agreement will expire on March 31, 2019.