In an effort to  strengthen faculty voice at California Lutheran University, an advocacy chapter of the American Association of University Professors was established on June 17, 2024.

According to the AAUP website, the nonprofit organization has helped advance higher education through its publications, data, and advocacy to shape procedures vital for academic freedom since 1915.

Professor Sheridan Wigginton, president of the CLU Faculty Alliance, said at the campus level, AAUP chapters can provide a mechanism for members and non-members to share perspectives lost within the representational governance model, giving full professors, associate professors, assistant professors, and adjunct faculty the opportunity to meet outside committee assignments to discuss university-related affairs.

“One of the things that I thought would be a really positive addition to our shared governance model was to, again, give faculty a mechanism through which they could meet as a whole— across their committee assignments, across their departments, across their academic divisions— to have similar discussions that echoed back to what we were able to do before we moved to the Senate model,” Wigginton said.

Wigginton said the AAUP is the most prominent professional organization for faculty to navigate different circumstances and situations they are trying to improve on campus.

Professor Dru Pagliassotti, secretary of the CLU Faculty Alliance, said the need to strengthen faculty voice on campus came after the 122-3 vote of no confidence regarding former University President Lori Varlotta. Pagliassotti also cited national concerns as a factor in their involvement.

“Given the attack on higher education, that’s also happening across the nation, I think that it’s even more important that people get involved in the AAUP, which keeps us updated and regular emails as to what’s going on with legislation and how we can try to react to and resist some of the more dangerous things that are coming out,” Pagliassotti said.

Cal Lutheran’s chapter currently has 21 members, with plans to keep growing. Professor Ryan Medders, vice president of the CLU Faculty Alliance, has led membership efforts and said faculty have been interested in learning more about the chapter since offering a workshop at the winter faculty retreat. 

“I would also argue that there’s a national climate that we are facing, that it’s good for people to come together, especially in our profession, to fight for the important things like academic freedom— the freedom to learn, the freedom to teach and the freedom to research,” Medders said.

Wigginton said AAUP membership gives chapter members many benefits, including a single location with documents helpful for reviewing current policies. Wigginton said this is particularly useful for full-time faculty active in shared governance to assist in making sound decisions for Cal Lutheran sensible within the larger, higher education context.

“Being able to go to a single location, that had done so much of that background work as a starting point for us, as members of shared governance and the faculty overall, was a huge time saver and a relief in that it gave us some confidence that some of our first steps that we would be taking in a thoughtful decision-making process was grounded in data, that it had been vetted from other professionals in our field,” Wigginton said.

Wigginton said using AAUP’s data on salaries, enrollment trends and shared governance policies has been helpful in reducing the workload for outside research.

“The reports that AAUP had already compiled were really helpful, because we could disgregate our own data and look at that through the lens that AAUP had provided at a larger scale. So that helped give some perspective to see where Cal Lutheran salaries for each level of the professoriate, as well as our as our adjunct faculty, where we sort of measure up,” Wigginton said.

The chapter will have its sixth and final meeting of the academic year on May 13. Wigginton said she is enthusiastic about short and long-term projects the chapter has in place for the upcoming year, including goals aimed at improving the university’s financial position.

“We are very much interested in learning more and participating actively in the work that Dr. Laureen Hill from the Board of Regents is carrying out, in thinking strategically about new directions or new directions for the university that is a really far-reaching project that has some work done in the shorter term and work that’s being considered in the longer term,” Wigginton said.

Wigginton said the chapter also intends to play an active role within advising and retention on campus and supporting students in ways that best serve their academic needs in addition to the budget.

“The university is having some budget issues, and that’s going to end up with a lot of reorganization in all aspects of the university. So I wanted to sort of keep an eye on that, and make sure the faculty have a voice in that,” Pagliassotti said.

Wigginton said a pilot program that returns a percentage of AAUP dues back to institutional chapters will launch next year, and that the CLU Faculty Alliance hopes to use this money to pay for website maintenance to maximize their outreach to new members. All faculty, regardless of membership status, are welcome to attend their meetings.

“We have adjuncts who have been here for years, in a conversation about an issue that is important to us on campus at the moment, in conversation with people who have been here for 30 years,” Wigginton said. “I love the idea that we can all sit in a room together, work on an issue, share ideas, and then think about what’s the best next step.”