Non-tenured faculty at Loyola U. reach agreement; vote set for later this week

After two years of negotiating, Loyola University Chicago’s non-tenure track faculty union has reached a tentative agreement with the school.

The deal was struck late Monday, and union members are scheduled to vote on the deal Thursday and Friday. They had staged a one-day strike earlier this month, spurred by what the union said were some last-minute counter-offers by the school.

“Late last night we reached an agreement on our first contract,” Alyson Paige Warren, an adjunct English instructor who’s on the bargaining team, said Tuesday morning. “We’re all very excited that after two years of bargaining we have an agreement.”

Negotiations centered around better pay and more job stability.

The deal provides “significant” pay increases that put Loyola’s non-tenure faculty “among the highest paid” in the Chicago area, according to the school.

Warren declined to comment on the specifics of the agreement.

“The tentative agreements reflect not only Loyola’s appreciation for the many contributions of our NTT faculty, but also our core mission of providing high-quality, affordable education to our students,” LUC President Jo Ann Rooney said in a statement.

The faculty voted about two years ago to unionize, and affiliated with Service Employees International Union Local 73.

After two years of back-and-forth between the school and the union — topped by nearly 12 hours of negotiations Monday — it felt good to have a deal on the table, Warren said.

“It’s wonderful. It’s thrilling. We’re very excited and proud of all our members for making this happen. Like any negotiation, compromises were made, and at this point I think we’re all just excited about the results and how we build a partnership moving forward,” Warren said.

“There’s a lot that’s good in this contract.”

Contributing: Mitchell Armentrout