UPDATE: After I sent out an email from TA, I learned that the SEIU has admitted that it was the “UW Faculty.
This raises additional issues .. see below:
My original post Jan 27, 2016 @ 17:48
Who is “The UW Faculty” and how are they surveying the UW faculty?
The survey seemed to be written by the kind of group that sends out surveys promoting political candidates. .. a “PUSH POLL.”
TA speculated that this was the product of the group organizing a union, the SEIU, or the AAUP.
There has now been a response by the UW’s Interim Provost Gerry Baldasty confirming that the Administration has also been unable to identify who is sending out these emails:
UPDATE From the UW Excellence Website:
Did you receive a survey via email on January 19? “We are a nationally-respected research company conducting a survey of what UW faculty members think about the future of the university, their own jobs, and their voice on campus and in Olympia.”
Did you wonder who initiated it? Did you wonder who funded it? Did you wonder if it was truly anonymous, as claimed? Did it strike you as worded with a significant pro-unionization bias?
Indeed, the survey was sent by and funded by SEIU Faculty Forward. And responses were not anonymous – every individual to whom the survey was addressed received a unique PIN contained in the response URL.
Caught red-handed by concerned faculty, Amy Hagopian fessed up (email below). (We note that most emails from concerned faculty were not posted to the AAUP listserv by those who control its content!
Censorship is alive and well at the University of Washington. And it’s AAUP / SEIU Faculty Forward that’s doing it!)
It is important for UW faculty to appreciate the lengths to which SEIU Faculty Forward will go. The integrity upon which we traditionally rely in our collegial environment is not a priority for the leaders of this effort. This is not the first example, nor is it likely to be the last.
From: Amy Hagopian
Subject: [AAUP] Faculty Forward and the Survey Kerfuffle
Date: January 23, 2016 at 14:02:01 PST
To: Abie Flaxman, Faculty Issues and Concerns
Reply-To: Faculty Issues and Concerns
Colleagues on the AAUP list server,
There have been concerns voiced on the list server about the recent survey on the views of faculty about unionization, commissioned by Faculty Forward. The aim of the survey was simply to assess current faculty views on the possibility of unionization. The Faculty Forward organizing committee takes very seriously the concerns of our colleagues about the way the survey was conducted. We regret that it was not done well and that some colleagues were inconvenienced. The survey has been stopped.