A hard-hitting report about the upside-down priorities at the University of Cincinnati has been released by current and former students at UC who are members of the Roosevelt Network.

The report criticizes UC’s lack of inclusiveness in decision-making and transparency. It challenges the university’s centralized budgeting model, which usurps money to the central administration — money that often is later allocated to non-academic areas, like deficit-generating athletic programs.

Ultimately, the report recommends increased transparency, greater student and faculty representation, decentralizing university funding, freezing tuition, and re-examining expenditures on athletics.

As described on its website, the Roosevelt Network trains, develops, and supports emerging progressive policymakers, researchers, and advocates on campuses and in cities across the US, focusing on communities historically denied political power.

WHAT YOU CAN DO TO HELP OUR DEMOCRACY IN 2020!

Sign up to be a poll worker.
https://www.ohiosos.gov/elections/poll-workers/signup/

Double check your voter registration.
https://voterlookupxss.ohiosos.gov/voterlookup.aspx

Make sure your family and friends are registered to vote.
https://voterlookup.ohiosos.gov/voterlookup.aspx

APPLY FOR MAIL-IN ABSENTEE BALLOT, AND MAKE SURE YOUR VOTE COUNTS!

Given the uncertainty this election, apply for your absentee ballot NOW.  Be sure to include your signature and fill in your date of birth. (commonly omitted info)
https://www.ohiosos.gov/elections/voters/absentee-ballot/

You can write your own application if you include the following info. 

https://www.ohiosos.gov/elections/voters/absentee-voting/

Where do I send my application? 

https://www.ohiosos.gov/elections/elections-officials/county-boards-of-elections-directory/

Track the status of your absentee application 

https://www.sos.state.oh.us/elections/voters/toolkit/ballot-tracking/

PROMPTLY RETURN FULLY COMPLETED BALLOT WITHOUT DELAY!

Fully complete the entire application including commonly omitted things like your signature and identification info. Do NOT tear off the stub at the bottom of the ballot!

If mailed, ballots must be postmarked by the day before the election (Nov. 2nd).

You can also drop your ballot at your local Board of Elections office or drop box up until 7:30 p.m. on Election Day. 
https://www.ohiosos.gov/elections/elections-officials/county-boards-of-elections-directory/

Absentee ballots cannot be returned at your polling place on Election Day. If you applied for an absentee ballot and show up at your Election Day polling location, you will need to cast a provisional ballot.

VOTE EARLY, IN PERSON

In person early voting begins Oct. 6 and runs up to Nov. 2, including to two Saturdays, two Sundays and the Monday before the election.
https://www.ohiosos.gov/elections/voters/absentee-voting/#inPerson

KEY DATES FOR THIS ELECTION

OCTOBER 5 
Voter Registration Ends

OCTOBER 6
Early voting begins in-person 
County Boards begin sending out absentee ballots

NOVEMBER 2
Early in-person voting ends at 2 p.m.

NOVEMBER 3
Election Day
Pollsare open 6:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m.

Full Voting Calendar
https://www.sos.state.oh.us/globalassets/publications/election/2020electioncalendar_12x18.pdf

As part of “Solidarity Summer” — a series of events hosted by the AAUP-Wright State University chapter — the chapter is hosting several virtual events focused on candidates and issues impacting Ohioans and the communities we serve. 

While the events are free, participants will be asked to consider a contribution to AAUP-WSU’s political action committee, which supports pro-education, pro-labor candidates in Ohio.

All are welcome to attend today’s Call to Action event from 3:00-4:00 p.m.

Join the Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/83081528320?pwd=TXFnd0tBRmVPeDd5amtkdmNwRHlTUT09

Meeting ID: 830 8152 8320
Password: 294418

Martin Kich
Professor of English, Wright State University
President-Elect, Ohio Conference of the American Association of University Professors

Ohio’s colleges and universities are contributing in uncountable ways to the state’s efforts to contend with the coronavirus pandemic. Our faculty have provided expertise that has helped our state to meet a wide range of challenges, from conducting ground-breaking bio-medical research to resolving unprecedented logistical and technological issues. Our institutions have opened their facilities and have donated their equipment to meet pressing community needs.

Our faculty have educated most of the medical professionals combatting the pandemic in our communities—the EMTs, the physicians, the nurses, and the other medical professionals from respiratory therapists to grief counselors, all of whom have inspired us with the strength of their commitment to their patients and to the public good.

Our faculty have also educated most of the other first responders—the police and the firefighters and the professionals who have maintained community services despite the dramatic disruptions that the pandemic has created in our daily lives.

Our faculty have also educated most of our leaders at all levels of government, in the business community, and in the non-profit sector—all of whom are meeting almost unimaginable challenges in a remarkably organized and efficient manner.

Graduates of our Public Health programs are organizing the contact tracing that will very shortly be necessary to contain the disease.

The academic programs that have produced these remarkable alumni/-ae maintain supplies of personal protective equipment, from masks and goggles to gloves and gowns. Just about every college and university in the state has donated their inventories of these essential PPE items to local hospitals in order to alleviate the shortages in their supplies.

In addition, some of the programs involve training with ventilators and respirators, which have also been loaned to the hospitals to meet sudden spikes in demand. In fact, several of the regional campuses that serve rural communities have even loaned hospital beds to the smaller hospitals there.

And when our institutions have not had the finished equipment on hand, they have provided materials needed to produce it or have actually begun to produce it.

For instance, the Theater Costume Shop at Lorain County Community Colleges has donated fabric appropriate for making masks.

Students in the Plastics Engineering Technology Program at Shawnee State University have designed special face shields for first responders and essential workers, and students at the University of Toledo and at other institutions have been using 3D printers to produce face shields.

Although the faculty, staff, and students have been working remotely, our campuses have not been shuttered completely. Some of our facilities are large enough to accommodate large numbers of people while also maintaining social distancing, and they have been used by local agencies for all sorts of purposes—from a blood-donation drive at Bowling Green State University to day-long food distribution to the needy, conducted by the local food bank, at Wright State University.

Beyond all of these immediately evident contributions, researchers at our universities have been contributing to the scientific innovations that will allow us to manage this disease. For instance, researchers at Ohio State University have made major contributions to multi-institutional efforts to develop effective and efficient COVID-19 testing.

In this crisis, our colleges and universities are demonstrating how integral they are to the well-being of our communities. In uncountable ways, they have enhanced the economic vitality and the quality of life within our communities. More importantly, even in the best of times and especially in the midst of a crisis such as this pandemic, they also are essential to preserving the lives of our family members and neighbors.

In the past few weeks virtually every college and university in the state has made or proposed drastic faculty and staff reductions in the face of financial difficulties exacerbated by the pandemic. Institutions of higher education will not be able to maintain their excellence, to sustain their contributions to communities and public health, or to keep students safe in the next academic year if they don’t receive more aid from the federal government. It would be a desperately needed investment not only to ensure that institutions survive, but to put them on footing to thrive for years to come.

[This message is borrowed from our friends at the Ohio Federation of Teachers (OFT). Educators in Ohio are starting to be contacted by “The Freedom Foundation” to encourage them to “opt-out” of their union membership in an attempt to further weaken unions after the Janus U.S. Supreme Court ruling.]

Who is the Freedom Foundation?

The Freedom Foundation is the latest in a long line of well-funded union-busting front groups that have set up shop in Ohio in an attempt to weaken our union and push their privatization agenda. The goal of these messages is to persuade union members to opt out of their unions, which would weaken our union voice and jeopardize the standards (pay, benefits, working conditions, rights at work) we have won over many years.

Weakening standards in public education, higher education, and children’s services is not just an attack on us, it’s an attack on Ohio’s students and children. It’s no surprise that Freedom Foundation receives funding from Donors Trust (funded by Charles Koch) and the Richard and Helen DeVos Foundation (funded by the family of U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos). The one percent increases their wealth and power by weakening the power of the 99 percent.

How did they get my email address or phone number?

Neither OFT nor your local union has provided any personal information to these groups or to any groups outside of our union. Safeguarding your personal information is a top priority for us.

Opt Out Today / Freedom Foundation has obtained some information through Freedom of Information Requests to state agencies, public employee retirement funds, and school districts. Since that information would not contain mobile phone numbers, we expect they have also purchased phone numbers from a vendor to match up with the names they had received through information requests.

What should I do if I’m contacted by Opt Out Today / Freedom Foundation?

If you are interested in having less power at the negotiating table the next time your contract is up, or you are interested in having fewer rights at work, then opting out of your union might be for you. You are welcome to reply to Opt Out Today / Freedom Foundation. However, you do not need to contact Opt Out Today / Freedom Foundation to opt out of your union. In your union contract, you can read how and when members of your local can withdraw membership.

If you do not want Opt Out Today / Freedom Foundation contacting you and seeking to weaken your union, here are some steps you can take.

• Let your Building Rep. or Local leadership know that you were contacted.
• Talk to your co-workers about this. Even though we are physically distanced from each other, it’s more important than ever that we check in with our co-workers, see how they’re doing during this stressful time, and make sure they understand that an anti-union front group may be contacting them.
• If you were contacted by email:
  • Any email they send should have an “unsubscribe” link at the bottom. Click to unsubscribe. If there is no unsubscribe link, or you are emailed again after you unsubscribe, let us know.
  • Since they emailed you through a mass email list that you did not sign up for, you can also report their email as spam by signing up for a free, anonymous account on spamcop.net
• If you were contacted by text:
  • They are using very ambiguous language that says “Reply stop to opt out.” It is unclear whether this is to opt out of text messages from them or to show interest in opting out of your union. We expect the language is intentionally vague in an effort to inflate their number of replies.
  • We suggest you respond with: “Please remove me from all text, phone, email, and mailing lists.” If they continue to contact you after that, let us know.
  • You can also block the phone number they are sending texts from, however they can change that number at any time and text from a different number

The Freedom Foundation, funded by out-of-state billionaires, knows how powerful a union voice can be and that’s why they’re spending so much money to collect your personal data and contact you. Let’s show them that we also understand what a strong union is worth.