What are some potential violations of the Collective Agreement?
All of the following are direct violations of the Collective Agreement between CUPE 3913 and the University of Guelph. If you experience any of these personally or if you know of them occurring to others, please contact our President, Unit 1 Steward, Unit 2 Steward or Labour Relations Coordinator – or all four - as soon as possible (see Key Contacts).
- Your supervisor doesn’t set up a meeting with you before the semester starts. Supervisors are required to meet with TAs prior to the start of classes to review the contract and go over expectations for TAs as per our CA.
- You’re not given safety training for an in-person lab. This is a health and safety violation. Supervisors must give you in-person safety training in the lab; a Courselink course is not enough.
- You see or are offered a TA work position that is less than 0.5 (70 hrs). Departments have attempted to assign 0.25 Work Assignments; however, our Collective Agreement explicitly states that Work Assignment contracts must be for a minimum of 0.5, or seventy (70) hours per semester.
- Your supervisor is pressing you to work more hours than outlined in your contract (e.g., 70 hours for 0.5 or 140 hours for 1.0). You are free to consent to work overtime – with the clear stipulation that you will be paid for said overtime. However, you are also free to refuse any work outside of the stated hours in your contract.
- You’re not informed about overtime pay after agreeing to work more hours than in your contract. You are entitled to overtime pay for anything above what is stated in your contract, but you and your supervisor must agree that you will be working overtime and your supervisor must get approval through the department.
- Your supervisor tells you to enforce safety protocols. This is not the job of our members. The University and its employees are tasked with this responsibility.
- Your supervisor bullies or discriminates against you.
What is a Grievance?
When rights or responsibilities as outlined by our Collective Agreement aren’t met (like in the examples above), it’s important that Members let us know. In many cases, we are able to resolve issues quickly, though in some cases more serious responses are required. In those instances, a Member may choose to file a grievance. A Grievance is “defined as any difference arising out of the interpretation, application, administration, or alleged violation of the Agreement.” (CUPE 3913 Collective Agreement, 1.04 (h)).
If you think a violation of the collective agreement has occurred to you or another member or members, please contact our Grievance Officer (grievance@cupe3913.on.ca).