Day 5 Of Rutgers Strike: Union Says Deal Reached On 1 Core Issue

NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ — The first-ever Rutgers faculty strike has now entered Day 5 on Friday. There is still no deal reached between university president Jonathan Holloway and the 9,000-some professors, lecturers and other faculty who walked off the job starting Monday morning.

A spokesman for Holloway struck a positive tone Friday morning.

"After another long day of negotiations on Thursday, we are making significant progress with the continued help, engagement and leadership of the Governor and his senior staff," said a Rutgers spokesman Friday morning. "University and union negotiating teams will resume negotiations today and we are optimistic we will reach agreement on fair contracts for all of our employees."

Meanwhile, the faculty union revealed a tentative agreement was reached Thursday on one of their core issues: Non-tenured full-time professors, who currently must be reappointed at the end of their contracts, will become eligible for “presumptive renewal."

This means they won’t have to reapply for their jobs every year.

More than 70 percent of Rutgers educators have to reapply for their jobs when their contracts expired, said Rutgers faculty union president Rebecca Givan. She called Thursday's agreement "a game changer."

However, she warned that there are still "important issues that need to be resolved." One of them is a pay raise for part-time lecturers. This has always been a top request from the union, and one it does not appear to be budging on. Part-time lecturers also still need to reapply for their jobs, and Givan said the union is asking that be removed, too.

Both sides continued to praise Gov. Murphy for getting involved.

“We’ve already accomplished more in a few days than we did in months, thanks to Gov. Murphy’s invitation for us to bargain in Trenton and the strength of our members on the picket line,” Givan said Friday morning. “But hard issues remain, and we have some distance to go before we have a contract.”

An all-day bargaining session will begin Friday morning, and talks are expected to continue through the weekend.

Also Thursday, U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) posted a video to his Twitter account, praising the Rutgers faculty. He called the professors on strike “courageous.”

"I want to congratulate the workers at @ruaaup for taking the courageous step to go on strike. You are inspiring the labor movement across this country. I am proud to stand in solidarity with you," said Sanders, a Democratic Socialist.