Dionte Berry
Editor-in-Chief
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The United Campus Workers of Kentucky chapter at Murray State is working towards highlighting the needs of faculty and staff amidst the tornadoes that swept through Western Kentucky and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. 

Forty-nine faculty and staff signed a petition that was sent to the members of the Board of Regents on Dec. 20, 2021. Along with the petition, the local UCW Kentucky chapter has helped bolster the voice of the Faculty Senate and their concerns about teaching flexibility with COVID-19. 

The Murray State Chapter of UCW Kentucky is a union open to all faculty, staff, student and graduate workers designed to give a voice to campus employees.

Antje Gamble is an art professor and founding member of local chapter. Gamble along with other leadership in the local chapter drafted the petition because of the lack of communication after the tornadoes, which has also been a growing issue throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The document itself focuses on the administration’s response and how long it took for any correspondence after the tragedy, and then the seeming lack of compassion in the response,” Gamble said. “Staff were asked to come back on Monday without any acknowledgement of the fact that some staff didn’t have internet or power yet, and so probably didn’t even get the email, let alone be able to come into work.”

The petition further stated there were no official employee safety check-ins and faculty and staff were only contacted to be told that the grading period was set to be extended. 

“We further highlighted how this was related to some other issues at the University,” Gamble said. “The example we put in the letter, or the petition, was that the COVID committee was dismantled without any kind of recognition, even though the pandemic continues.”

The goals of the petition are threefold. First, the local chapter wanted to make the Board of Regents aware of the issues employees are facing. 

Second, the Board of Regents must give campus employees a voice with shared governance and give the Staff and Faculty Regent equal power to other Regents on the Board.

“Historically, Staff and Faculty Regent are figureheads,” Gamble said. “They aren’t asked to have real input on the Board.”

 Lastly, the local chapter is demanding transparency and clear communication from the administration. 

Along with Gamble, postsecondary education administration professor Brian Bourke is an organizing member of the Murray State Chapter of UCW Kentucky. 

When Bourke received the email about the provision of two KN95 masks being available for students upon their return to campus, he said he was thankful the University was providing them but wondered what else was being done to slow the spread of COVID-19.

“How many times can those masks be reused? Are we going to be getting more? Is this a one and done now you’re on your own to get more masks,” Bourke said. “That’s just one example of some communication shortcomings around the pandemic. [The administration] continued to use basically the same weekly emails, ‘We encourage you to get your shots, we encourage you to wear your mask.’”

Beyond encouraging, Bourke said he felt that there was not much else being done. There was not a sense of enforcement or an actual clear administration response. Bourke also found accommodations for teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic to be difficult to come by. 

“When faculty and staff have brought up issues around working from home, flexibility and teaching or other work arrangements, the responses increasingly become, well, if you have a legitimate medical need, you the employee, need to work toward seeking accommodations through either the IDEA Office or Human Resources,” Bourke said.

Although both the IDEA Office and Human Resources serve to help both students and employees, Bourke had found that they are  more accommodating to University policy rather than those who need to be accommodated.

“We need leaders to recognize that we’re all human and we all deserve to be shown compassion. “We don’t need to fill out an hourly log of the tasks that we complete. In the event that we do work from home, which was a mandate for us.”

By issuing the petition to the members of the Board of Regents, Bourke said his ideal outcome from this would be to have a clearer, more open and compassionate avenue of communication between campus workers and the administration. 

Associate mass communication professor and Faculty Regent Melony Shemberger has been the only Regent to respond to the Chapter’s petition.  

In her response to the Chapter, Shemberger said she appreciated being included in the reception of the petition and told them she would share it with the leadership in the Faculty Senate where she serves in an advisory capacity.

“I told them that I spoke a couple of weeks ago with President Jackson about the concerns that the faculty, including me, had regarding the lack of communication after the Dec. 10, tornado,” Shemberger said. “I asked that they review their University’s communication protocol that they follow when we have either inclement weather or any disasters on campus, anything that really would necessitate the need for some mass communication.”

Along with her response to the Chapter’s petition, Shemberger signed a letter drafted by the officers of the Faculty Senate that was sent to President Jackson and Provost Tim Todd. 

The letter addressed concerns about how COVID-19 cases were increasing over the winter break and asked for teaching flexibility for the beginning of the Spring Semester. 

“There were some health reports coming from the CDC that even indicated that there could be a large surge in the next two to three weeks,” Shemberger said. “Then, starting back the Spring Semester the protocol is to follow what we did last fall, which is still to have in-person classes and wear masks indoors. Well, that concerned us.”

Shemberger said the additional flexibility would allow professors to pivot for two weeks to online learning. The letter also further raised concerns about the rise of COVID-19 cases and the lack of action toward protecting. 

Todd responded to the letter denying the Faculty Senates’ request for flexibility. 

“Provost Todd responded on behalf of him and President Jackson, basically to indicate that they appreciated our concerns,” Shemberger said. “Since we did well with what we had in place last fall, that would continue in the spring.”

Shemberger said she understands the administration’s concerns, but this flexibility was had in 2020 and 2021, so it can be done.