Yet another Illinois university is on track to see its faculty strike, unless a late agreement is struck between campus leadership and UPI Local 4100. Northeastern Illinois University's faculty voted overwhelmingly to strike earlier this week; such a strike would begin in late April, probably on April 24th as things currently stand.
The story is similar to what has motivated other Illinois university faculty to strike this month: better pay and recognition of the additional work that faculty have taken on in recent years. As noted in the previous post about Illinois's ongoing wave of faculty strikes, education in the state has been badly defunded when accounting for inflation–and NEIU is another university whose majority-minority student body has taken the brunt of such impacts.
Unique twists in the university's situation should also be noted, however: for one, a planned contract renegotiation was put on pause due to the pandemic and the 2014 contract rolled over as a consequence. NEIU faculty have thus been working under their 2014 contract for three additional years than they ordinarily would have. The university has also been, bluntly, mismanaged and poorly led–most substantially, a budget crisis is ongoing. This year budget cuts and "departmental restructuring" have been proposed; the university is expected to have a deficit of over $11 million this year. Students and faculty alike have protested the attempted downsizing, a decision ultimately being made by outgoing university president Dr. Gloria J. Gibson and her leadership team.
Dr. Gibson, the first Black woman to lead the university, is also a controversy in her own right: her contract was not renewed under circumstances best deemed a complete shitshow. She alleges gender and racial discrimination as factors in the decision; she also alleges members of the university board attempted to push her out after she refused favorable treatment for a board member's wife. Her relations with faculty are so frayed that the faculty Senate recently called for her immediate removal because she attempted to use an FOIA to acquire communications between university board members and NEIU community members. The university has not yet lined up a replacement for her. All in all: a big mess that has left faculty feeling no choice but to strike.
It of course remains to be seen if they will, but... seems pretty cut and dry given what's happened at other Illinois universities.