Student exams are back on this week after the Capilano Faculty Association suspended its strike action Monday night.
“We are pleased to report that the CFA has agreed to suspend its strike action to enable students to proceed with their final exams, on the revised schedule, beginning Thursday (April 16),” Borjana Slipicevic, Capilano University senior communications advisor, told The Squamish Chief.
Faculty resumed their duties and campuses were open starting on Tuesday, according to Slipicevic.
The two parties will continue discussions through non-binding mediation, she noted.
The strike at Capilano University was entering its second week. Exams had originally been scheduled to start April 13.
Faculty association president Brent Calvert told The Squamish Chief the revised schedule could have been avoided, had the university administration and the Post Secondary Employers Association agreed to mediation when it was requested by the CFA on Saturday.
He said his members were glad, however, that mediation was finally set to start.
“We are hopeful in the mediation process,” he said, adding the mediation process has until the end of June. If the union does not ratify an agreement, the strike could be back on, he said.
Pickets went up at 7 a.m. on Wednesday, April 8, at the Squamish campus and had left about 60 students and about a dozen faculty and support staff in limbo.
Jamie Boyes, a first-year business student at the Squamish campus, said Monday that the strike has been stressful. “It is a bit crazy. It has affected everyone,” she said. “It is just the uncertainty of not knowing when your exams are.”
Boyes said she had not taken a side in the labour dispute. She said she thinks the university did a good job of keeping students in the loop about their schedule.
All Capilano campuses, including Squamish, North Vancouver and Sunshine Coast, had picket lines up due to the job action. The Squamish campus was closed.
The CFA and the university administration had been meeting since 3 p.m. Saturday to resolve the dispute, Calbert said.
According to Calvert, the issues between the association and the university are longstanding and include a lack of academic freedom, a less than democratic workplace, and a lack of support and consistency for part-time professors.
“It has never been about wages,” he said.
Capilano faculty voted 80 per cent in favour of a strike in early March.
The university site is www.capilanou.ca. The faculty association site is capilanofaculty.ca.
