They continue to move up.

Call HR and talk to Janae Jacoby, jjacoby@sbccd.edu. You do not have to contact anyone else. She will take care of it. However, it is probably a good idea to talk to your chair to let them know, as a courtesy.

All faculty (FT and PT) are potentially eligible, when the bargaining unit brings something to a vote. Which types of issues require a vote? Examples include elections for Executive Board positions or ratification of a tentative agreement resulting from bargaining (e.g., involving wages, benefits, other contract language, etc.). However, only active members shall be permitted to vote. Furthermore, PT and FT members have equal representation (one person = one vote), so every vote really does count. In order to become active and exercise your right to vote, you must fill out a membership form. If you have not received your CTA membership card for the current academic year, please let us know right away, because it is likely that you are not an active member. Keep in mind, that membership becomes active on the date you sign the form. This means that if you do not receive a ballot for a particular election, then contact us immediately so that you can apply for membership and be permitted to cast a vote.

In 1975, U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the ‘Weingarten’ case, that employees have the right to representation in a meeting that they (the member) believe could lead to disciplinary action. Should members ever feel that they are in such a meeting with a supervisor, they should say something like this,

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“If my response to your questions could lead to my being disciplined, I request union representation at this meeting, and that the meeting be postponed until my union representative arrives.”

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Once members have made this request their supervisor has two options:

Wait for the union representative to arrive. Call off the interview and proceed with the investigation without the benefit of the employee’s input. (source: cca4me.org). Actually, there is a third option. The supervisor can ignore the member’s request for representation and continue the meeting even though this violates a member’s rights. If this occurs members should understand that leaving the meeting could be seen as an act of insubordination. Before continuing the member should declare,

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“I want you to understand, I am attending this meeting under duress so as not to be seen as insubordinate, but as soon as I finish this meeting I will contact my union representative to seek legal action against the district.”

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There are others nuances to Weingarten, but the ability of union members to receive support and representation from their union is not negotiable. If a member ever feels uncomfortable about the course a meeting is taking they should stop the meeting and invoke their Weingarten rights.

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To learn more about the Weingarten decision and your rights as an employee visit these links on the Community College Association (CCA) website 

• Weingarten Basic Rights Overview

• Weingarten Basic rights from CTA Legal 

Or contact a member of the executive board.

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As part of our move towards online voting, a sbccdta.org email account will be created for every member. There will always be some lag times between becoming a member and receiving the member email account, but the intent is to create this accounts as quickly as we can. If you are unsure if you have an account contact your SBCCDTA Vice President (SBCCDTA VPs are the union’s membership chairs) Your college’s SBCCDTA VP should be able to answer any of your membership questions, including questions about email accounts.

A question that is asked by many members around the middle of the semester is, “how many evaluations am I required to do?” This question arises as peer evaluations are set up by the Academic Senate, Department Chairs, and Deans. The answer is found in Article 16, Evaluations Procedures.

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From Article 16, 2, f.

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“A unit member, other than Department Heads, shall not be required to participate in more than two peer reviews per year unless the unit member so agrees. A unit member, other than a Department Head, shall not be required to serve as a peer reviewer during any semester when he/she is being evaluated unless the unit member so agrees.”

No, it does not.

One of the most important benefits of being an active member is the Educators Employment Liability insurance (up to $1,000,000), which is an automatic benefit at no extra cost and begins the date you sign the membership form. Every CTA member receives coverage for legal defense costs in lawsuits arising out of his or her educational employment activities. Fee-payers receive extremely limited protection. Other CTA benefits and NEA benefits are also available.

The part-time faculty voice does matter. SBCCDTA is a wall-to-wall unit, which means ALL faculty (PT and FT) are bargaining unit members. Another benefit of being an active member is the right to vote in union elections at the local, state, and national levels (one person, one vote). At the local level, we hold elections for positions on the Executive Board, and ratification votes for our collective bargaining agreement. Both the District and the union have opened articles in the contract this year, and negotiations have begun. If you are not an active member, then you miss the opportunity to vote!

Please reset your password.

As part of our move towards online voting, a sbccdta.org email account has been created for every active member. Non-members do not receive a union email account.

SBCCDTA completely controls our sbccdta.org domain and, therefore, these email accounts have the following advantages over other email accounts:

• An SBCCDTA email account will NEVER be offered to a 3rd party for marketing purposes

• Each account has unlimited storage (limits have been set initially but can be changed by requesting more storage space)

• Accounts are not tied (in any way) to district servers (district can’t snoop on your email)

• It’s easy to forward your sbccdta email account to another email account

Baby Bonding: Instructors can use 50% pay for 12 weeks of baby bonding time. In order to be eligible for Parental Leave/Baby Bonding, an employee must meet the eligibility criteria which is that they are employed with the District for one year and have a signed contract for all of the covered weeks (i.e. sign up for classes). (*There are no eligibility criteria for the disability portion/Pregnancy Disability).

Maternity Disability: In general, there is no coverage for maternity disability. This is the time mothers take off at the end of the pregnancy and after birth. The disability portion of leave is dictated by the physician. Pregnancy disability begins the day the physician places you off work through the date that you are recovered from childbirth. A typical example would be 2 weeks prior to delivery through 6 weeks after delivery (vaginal birth) or 8 weeks after delivery (c-section). If you are higher on the pay scale than your replacement during this time, then you would get the difference. 

You become an active member as of the date you sign the form. Which means you are eligible to receive the benefits of membership beginning on the date you sign the form. We send the information to CTA within a day or two of receiving your completed application, and it typically takes CTA a few weeks to process the application and send you your membership card.

How to get a membership form:

1. Get a membership form either contact your campus Vice President or get an online form.

2. Complete the form

3. Return the form to your campus Vice President or another member of your Executive Board.

4. A signed copy of the form and your union card will be mailed to your home address.

SBCCDTA.org email accounts can be reached using any web browser.

To access your account, find the SBCCDTA Email ‘LOGIN HERE’ link in the right menu of virtually all sbccdta.org web pages (including this one). Note: You can also go straight to the login screen by going to sbccdta.org/webmail.

Unfortunately, many employees believe that standing up for their rights might result in some kind of reprisal or retaliation from an administrator or the District. Members are protected against this kind of action by the Educational Employees Relations Act (EERA).

The language referring to this right to exercise our rights as members of a union is found in the Non-Discrimination article of our contract: Specifically, Article 7B, which reads,

“The District and/or the Association shall not legally impose or threaten to impose reprisals on employees, to discriminate or threaten to discriminate against employees, or otherwise to interfere with, restrain, or coerce employees because of their exercise of rights guaranteed by the EERA.”

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