The theme of this year’s Fair Employment Week, ‘Fair for All,’ highlights the importance of protecting all academic staff, from professors to librarians and researchers, working at universities across Canada.
The 2014 Fair Employment Week, Oct. 27-31, will again strive to improve post-secondary education in universities and colleges across Canada and “opposes the casualization of academic work.”
Organised by the Canadian Association of University Teachers(CAUT), the week is set to highlight the plight of academic staff hired on limited-term contracts, which forces many of them to rely on employment insurance to makes ends meet. Along with a lack of job security, with figures showing up to one-third of young academics are employed on short contracts, access to social protections and employment benefits for all are hard to come by.
The CAUT and its member associations work with and join unions and activists across North America to raise awareness of exploitation occurring at academic institutions across the continent.
Among this year’s initiatives, the CAUT is spearheading a letter-writing campaign targeting university and college presidents, Canadian Minister of Employment and Social Development and Minister of Multiculturalism Jason Kenney, and local Members of Parliament.
The CAUT, an Education International (EI) affiliate, represents 68,000 academic and general staff at more than 120 Canadian universities and colleges.
Photo credit: Jacky Delorme