Parties diligently seeking new Works Council candidates: “We’re approaching basically everyone”
With posters, e-mails, and even election websites, the UvA is doing everything possible to draw attention to the Works Council elections in early April. How can the parties ensure that enough employees will stand for election this year? Folia surveyed four parties.
Three years ago, four faculties had too few candidates to hold elections. The people on the list could immediately take their seats, while the others remained vacant. Parties now want to avoid that scenario at all costs. With elections approaching, time is running out. How can parties ensure that they have enough candidates on the lists for the upcoming works council elections?
FNV
The FNV (Federatie Nederlandse Vakbeweging) has traditionally been well-represented on the electoral lists at the UvA. This year, for example, the FNV’s candidate list at the Faculty of Social and Behavioral Sciences (FMG) is already in good shape with 25 candidates. Presumably, this success is due in part to the fact that this year the FNV has begun to work more closely with the other union, the Algemene Onderwijsbond (AOb).
Both unions recently decided to adopt a shared list for this FMG election. This is a first, an approach that has yet to be adopted by other faculties. “It seemed logical to us because we have a lot of trouble explaining exactly what the difference is between the two parties,” explains Luisa Steur, FMG Works Council member on behalf of AOb. “Historically, of course, there are differences,” she continues, “the two unions have different origins.” But in terms of content, the differences are nil.
The shared list, however, still indicates whether the candidate comes from the AOb or the FNV. Because, Sturgeon explains, “If people do care, they can still decide on that basis.” By the way, being a member of the FNV is not a requirement to get on the FNV candidate list, explains Johan de Deken, Works Council member at FMG.
Every faculty at the UvA has a faculty works council, an employee participation body that exercises control and cooperates with the faculty board. At the UvA-wide level, there is also a works council, called the Central Works Council (COR), which helps consider and decide on all university policies.
This COR consists of 16 members: each faculty works council and the central departments send two delegates to the COR.
He continues: “We basically approach everyone who is interested. This is done mainly through personal appeals, posters at the photocopiers and in the elevator, and through e-mails. But we are limited at the UvA in what we can do. For example, we cannot use existing mailing lists of program groups, departments, or faculty. Nor can I just look at the details of the list of FNV members at the UvA to contact the FNV members at FMG.”
The Amsterdam Academy
Unlike the unions, De Amsterdamse Academie (DAA) does not have a long list of members that could (potentially) be approached, says vice president Annemie Ploeger. So naturally one turns to the programme committee for recruiting candidates, she says. “After all, they are already critically monitoring education.”
But for the DAA, a lot also depends on the personal approach of asking around and inquiring. “People of whom you think, hey, he’s had a critical opinion about that before.” At FMG, the faculty for which psychology professor Ploeger himself is active, that method has so far yielded five candidates. That’s one more than three years ago and three more than in 2018, the year The Amsterdam Academy was founded. In short, there is an upward trend. Ploeger is therefore optimistic: “We are moving forward, step by step.”
Besides FMG, The Amsterdam Academy is active at three other faculties, namely Natural Sciences, Mathematics and Computer Science (FNWI) and Humanities (FGw). At FNWI, the party has visited all departmental meetings, hoping to recruit new candidates. “That’s where we have been most active,” Ploeger says. But the effort turned out to be in vain. “As far as I know, that didn’t produce any new candidates, which is kind of a shame.”
Thus, as in previous election years, it appears to be difficult for parties to find enough candidates. What is the reason? Two answers often come to mind, Ploeger says. One is that people have just landed a fellowship or started a new teaching job and they don’t want to take time away from it right away. The other is that people think about it for a while, but then come to the conclusion that it’s not really for them.
It is also notable that support staff—secretaries and student advisors, for example—are generally given less leeway to sit on a works council compared to academic staff. “That’s definitely an issue,” Ploeger says. The latter group has the option in their contract to devote one day a week to Works Council work. “That makes it attractive for people willing to give up a day of teaching.”
For support staff, on the other hand, it is less obvious what tasks they can get rid of and who could take them on if they are on the Works Council one day a week, Ploeger says. “And of course, that can be tricky.” Yet this is not the most common argument among support staff. “They sit on the Works Council mainly among academic staff, which can be a bit intimidating,” Ploeger notes. “But it doesn’t have to be that way at all. At FMG, a student advisor sat on the council for years and did a really good job.”
AOb
Luisa Steur of the AOb recognizes the conflict. “We have always struggled to find enough support staff for the list. It’s hard for them to get enough time for Works Council work because it’s harder for them to adjust their duties adequately.” Nevertheless, this time Sturgeon and her party managed to find three candidates from support staff.
In any case, the AOb’s campaign at FMG is going well so far. No fewer than 25 people have already applied for the shared list of AOb and FNV, and applications are still open. This is more than enough candidates to fill all 15 seats at FMG, especially since the DAA, as mentioned above, also has five applications for this faculty works council.
Slowly, then, the AOb and FNV have begun discussing the order of the electoral list. “We have now found a good formula for that,” Steur says. The idea is that three former experienced members of the Works Council—one from the AOb and two from the FNV—propose the composition of the electoral list such that there is the best possible representation in terms of department, function, gender, and experience. “An independent, well-informed group,” Sturgeon said. “That seemed the most fair to us.”
“I understand it’s a bit unusual,” Steur says. She knows other faculties’ stories all too well. AOb alumnus Paul Koopman, for example, reports receiving requests from various quarters to recruit from his Humanities faculty. “From the AOb, of course, but also from the Works Council.” He agrees that “It is so important that we have good, diverse representation in the Works Council. New people are very important for that.”
Koopman is already running for his fifth term on the Humanities Works Council, but he would rather make way for “new élan.” He would recommend being on the Works Council to anyone. “You get a look behind the scenes of educational policy and get to have a say in workload, diversity, internationalization, that sort of thing.” It is an enrichment of your university life, Koopman says.
Still, you often have to explain to people what the Works Council is, Steur adds, “because it’s not that well known.” All the better that at the FMG she already has more than enough candidates, “although it is always better to have even more people,” she says. So the AOb keeps looking for new people, even at FMG.
PhD list
For the new PhD list, it is all about campaigning to win over potential candidates. Pim van Leeuwen, a PhD student and member of the Central Works Council (COR), is conducting a campaign at the FNWI, where the initiative for a PhD election list began.
“So far we have three PhD students running for the FNWI,” van Leeuwen says. “That’s encouraging. But there is a chance that people will drop off the list during the term. So we have also entered into a list alliance with the AOb because they feel strongly about the rights of PhDs.”
So these parties are also working together to ensure that lists do not become depleted. If that does happen for the FNWI PhD students, AOb members can take their place, according to Van Leeuwen. “But preferably AOb members who are also PhD students.”
There is actually no competition between them, says Koopman of the AOb. “There are so many PhD students at our faculty and university...they have to be represented in the Works Council.”
“I notice that many PhD students are interested,” says Van Leeuwen, “but what I encounter is that they are either already almost at the end of their PhD trajectory, or just at the beginning, and doubt whether it is a good idea to become a member. Sometimes it almost seems like people would feel guilty if they did. I sometimes spend more time explaining that it’s okay to become a member of the Works Council when you start your PhD and that the Executive Board encourages it, than actually talking about our positions.”
Not only do the parties want to draw attention to the upcoming Works Council elections, the Executive Board also wants to ensure that lists do not remain empty this year. At the Faculty of Economics and Business—where elections could not be held three years ago—the marketing and communications department supported the Faculty Works Council by launching a bilingual campaign.
Information sessions
This was done through an election website with a video featuring faculty, researchers, and support staff speaking from the Works Council. Two information meetings were also organized, in addition to the usual campaign through posters, flyers, and e-mails. In recent weeks, Van Leeuwen has been busy campaigning with e-mails, personal appeals, and talks during coffee breaks. On Tuesday afternoon, he visited the Technology Center where he called attention to the Works Council and PhD voter list. As a doctoral student who regularly requests a customized tool for his research, he is now a familiar face there.
The roughly 20 employees listen attentively to his story. “The Works Council speaks for all of us, while in the current council, professors are over-represented. I therefore heartily encourage you to become a member of the Works Council yourselves. Should that fail this Works Council election, vote for the PhD list.”
At the other faculties, the doctoral lists are not yet going strong. At the law faculty, there are no candidates for the PhD list at the time of writing, and at the economics faculty, one candidate is expected to stand for election. The Works Council chairman at the FEB, Roger Pruppers, is nevertheless pleased. “This makes it likely that PhD students will be formally represented in the Works Council for the first time, which we would be very happy about. It’s about time, shall we say.” Exactly how many PhD students will apply via the PhD list will be seen after March 18th.
Between March 11th and March 18th, 2024, voting UvA employees can run for faculty works councils.
