UPDATE 3/7/2025:
The Nevada Board of Regents, swayed by input from faculty leaders, rejected the proposal to modify the Title 2 policies. The existing policy, which requires the final appeal of Chapter 6 proceedings that may result in faculty termination to be submitted to the full Board for final resolution.

ORIGINAL POST 2/6/2025:
A proposal to modify Title 2 policies in the Board of Regents Handbook, which alarmed many NSHE faculty members when it was introduced last December, will have its second reading and possible approval at the March 6-7 Board of Regents meeting at Nevada State University in Henderson. Chapter 6, and Chapter 8 for DRI professionals, outline faculty discipline policies, including termination for cause. The changes would grant the Chancellor final authority over faculty termination appeals, requiring consultation only with the Board's chair, excluding other Regents from the process.

Most faculty who responded to NFA's request for input last November were concerned that the change will make the process for faculty appeals even more opaque and tilt the balance in favor of the administration. Although appeals under the existing policy are heard in a closed hearing of Regents during one of their meetings, Nevada's open meeting laws require the agenda to list the appeal and the hearing. The new policy will likely bypass this, placing the decision in the hands of the Chancellor instead of 13 Regents.

The NFA issued a letter to the Board of Regents opposing the proposal and asserting that the changes would violate the long-standing doctrines from AAUP's 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure. The principles, and recent interpretations of them, establish that the governing board is responsible to review appeals and take the final action. By removing the Board from the process, the proposal diminishes due process and removes what little transparency exists because proceedings will no longer appear on Board agendas. Giving the authority exclusively to the Chancellor curtails the diversity of perspectives from the full Board and tips the balance in favor of the administration. At the December Board meeting, members asked about an alternative that would give faculty members the option to direct their appeals either directly to the Chancellor or to an Appeals Board consisting of the Chancellor and selected members of the Board.

The NFA urges all faculty members to contact their Regent and tell them to reject the current proposal to modify Title 2, Chapters 6 and 8 in the Handbook and consider other options. All avenues of due process must be exhausted in proceedings where an individual's career or an institution's reputation are at stake.

NSU Faculty Senate Chair David Cooper speaks in support of collective bargaining at the university

The Nevada Board of Regents, on Friday, March 7th, approved a petition from the Nevada State University chapter of the Nevada Faculty Alliance for recognition as an official bargaining agent for university faculty, paving the way for an organizing vote in April. 

Despite Regents voicing concerns about the "antiquated language" in the policy governing collective bargaining - a concern that NFA shares - the vote was nearly unanimous with only Regent Goodman abstaining.

More than 70% of NSU faculty signed cards affirming their desire to move forward with a vote to organize a bargaining unit and 67% of the faculty body are already members of NFA. The vote in April will very likely be in favor of the bargaining unit.

If successful, NSU-NFA will be the fourth institution, and the first university, in the Nevada System of Higher Education with established collective bargaining rights for faculty.  Once established, the chapter will have the right to notify the administration of their intent to enter negotiations in accordance with Board policy. 

For a second year in a row, Kevin Osorio-Hernandez, a student leader at Nevada State University, has brought the raw emotions of his fellow students across the state into stark relief in his comments to the Nevada Board of Regents during their meeting on March 6th. Speaking as chair of the Nevada Student Alliance, he described the anxiety and confusion confronting students in the changing political landscape and pleaded with the Board to fight for the state's most vulnerable students while celebrating the richness that multiple cultures bring to the educational experience. He sets a standard that all individuals in the Nevada System of Higher Education should aspire to. No description will adequately capture his eloquence and courage, so we provide this link to video of his powerful and moving comments.

Osorio-Hernandez's remarks follow comments he made just over one year ago during the March 1, 2024, meeting of the Board of Regents where he called out a member of the Board for insensitive transphobic comments and asked him to "change his paradigm."

The Nevada Faculty Alliance salutes Mr. Osorio-Hernandez for demonstrating true leadership and speaking truth to power. 

The start of Spring Semester 2025 in Nevada will be remembered by faculty primarily for the confusion and anxiety caused by the disruptive executive orders targeting higher education from the newly installed presidential administration in Washington, DC.

Although the barrage of orders has now slowed, and our national affiliates, the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) and the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), have succeeded in temporarily derailing some of the attacks in the court, irreversible damage has already been done to academic programs and the students enrolled in them.

AFT recently released statistics on how proposed cuts to the Department of Education - if not the Department's outright elimination - may cost Nevadans. For NSHE and its students, those cuts could impact programs and services that add up to a staggering $13.2 billion in Nevada alone. Yes, that's billion, with a b.

• $13 billion in federal student loans, supporting over 363,000 Nevadans pursuing education beyond a high school diploma, including first-generation college students.
• $264 million in Pell grants, ensuring over 57,000 students can pursue a college degree regardless of income status.
• $1.7 million to support students enrolled in Nevada’s five minority-serving institutions, such as a historically Black college or university, a Hispanic-serving institution, a tribal college or university, or an Asian American and Native American Pacific Islander-serving institution.
• $20 million to help underrepresented students succeed—including those who are the first in their families to attend college, are from lower-income households or have disabilities.

These are just the higher education benefits received from the Department of Education. AFT calculates that K-12 is exposed for $320 million and workforce development programs offered at both K-12 and post-secondary levels add another $47 million and another $2 million for community programs that bolster education.

Those are just the numbers of what's at risk from the Department of Education. UNR estimates that proposed cuts in programs funded through the National Institutes of Health would eliminate more than $4 million per year in research infrastructure, while UNLV pegs its number at $2.5 million. DRI's impact may be as much as $1 million. 

The list goes on and the damage will be real, especially for so many of our students who have invested time and money in pursuit of their chosen fields of study only to watch their aspirations shattered by malicious ideologues.

The NFA encourage all faculty members to actively resist these unprecedented ideological intrusions. We urge you join us in advocating to Congress and NSHE administrators for protections. Here are some suggestions:

• Push Congress to overturn the executive orders by passing laws that will preserve vital programs and protect a student's right to learn without ideological disruptions.
• Insist that campus and NSHE leaders avoid anticipatory obedience and refrain from implementing stricter policies than what is mandated.
• Demand unambiguous guidance from campus administrations regarding the rights and responsibilities of faculty and students on immigration actions.
• Share stories of how these actions have directly impacted your program and students in the NFA members' forum (log-in required).

Assembly Bill 191, which would establish collective bargaining for NSHE professionals in state law, is making steady progress through the 83rd session of the Nevada Legislature. Following the first hearing in the Assembly's Government Affairs Committee on Tuesday, March 4th, the bill will advance through a series of hearings before reaching the full Assembly.

With only slight updates, this measure is similar to AB224, the bill that passed with bipartisan support during the previous legislative session but was vetoed by the Governor at the end of the session in 2023. As with the previous session, this bill would codify the right of NSHE faculty (and graduate students) to collectively bargain, as well as provide us with access to resources like the Employee-Management Relations Board (EMRB) that other public employees, including classified staff at NSHE, enjoy.

NFA representatives, working with the bill sponsor, Assemblymember Natha Anderson, see this as a necessary step to ensure that NSHE faculty have a shared foundation and guarantee for what we can start to negotiate in collective bargaining. For institutions that already have collective bargaining agreements, passing this bill means that the next time they negotiate a new contract, they’ll be able to include a step to resolve grievance appeals through arbitration. The EMRB will also be available to resolve contract disputes. Faculty at institutions that don't already engage in collective bargaining will have a well-defined process if they choose to organize into a bargaining unit in the future.

In advocating for this bill again this session, NFA officers emphasize that faculty working conditions are student learning conditions, and that faculty, administrators, and students all benefit when faculty have an effective say in the policies and processes that guide our important educational work:

• Having mutually agreed upon rules and expectations between faculty and management means better faculty retention;
• Retention contributes to higher quality of education and focus on our students;
• Faculty ability to speak for and advocate for ourselves and students without fear of retaliation;
• Clear and consistent policies mean conflicts can be addressed efficiently and fairly–letting us focus our resources on education and research and not on navigating workplace grievances.

The Nevada Graduate Student Workers/UAW, who have organized graduate student assistants at UNR, UNLV, and DRI, have joined NFA's efforts. They’ve been part of updates to the bill, ensuring that graduate students employed by NSHE can form communities of interests for the sake of collective bargaining. Currently, the Board of Regents policy that allows collective bargaining–not substantially updated since 1990–does not include graduate students at all.

NFA's AB 191 Fact Sheet describes the provisions of the bill.

We encourage NFA members to reach out to their Assemblymember or Senator to let them know you are in support of AB 191.

Collective Bargaining may be new to you, but it's not new to higher education, or the NFA. Below are the questions we get asked most frequently. If you have more questions, please direct them to your NFA Chapter!

What’s collective bargaining?

Collective bargaining is the process of workers coming together to negotiate a contract with their employers. A collectively bargained contract sets the terms of employment within the confines of the law. It can address issues like health and safety, pay, benefits, leave time, and how problems will be dealt with when they inevitably come up.

Collective bargaining isn’t something that happens to you…it’s something that happens WITH you, where your issues and concerns are brought together with those of your peers to address problems. To learn more, you can read here: https://aflcio.org/what-unions-do/empower-workers/collective-bargaining

Do I have a collective bargaining agreement (CBA)?

If you’re an academic or (non-managerial) administrative faculty member at TMCC, or academic faculty member at WNC or CSN, you are covered by a collective bargaining agreement. You’re represented by your campus NFA chapter. You can find current CBAs here: https://www.nevadafacultyalliance.org/page-1464388

Who is NFA?

NFA is the Nevada Faculty Alliance, it’s been the independent association of faculty since 1983. We are an organization AT the universities and colleges of the NSHE system but not OF them. That means NFA answers to no one but our members: not the Deans, not the Presidents, not the Regents, not the Governor. We advocate for faculty at all chapters, and bargain collectively for them at TMCC, WNC, and CSN.  The NFA is the Nevada affiliate of the American Association of University Professors and the American Federation of Teachers. 

Ok, I’m on board, how do we get a collective bargaining agreement?

If you’re at TMCC, WNC, and CSN, you have a CBA. Get involved by attending an NFA meeting and volunteering!

If you’re at Nevada State University, there is a push for a CBA right now! Contact your NFA chapter to get involved and learn about next steps.

If you’re at GBC, UNLV, or UNR, you don’t currently have a CBA. We know from our internal polling that more than 75% of faculty are interested in pursuing a CBA on these campuses. Regardless of whether we pursue a CBA at present, the NFA is fighting for faculty on every campus, and we need you. One of the things we are working on is making it EASIER to form a CBA, and have that CBA be respected, if a majority of faculty want it. More details on that below.

Is it worth joining NFA if my campus doesn’t have a CBA yet?

Absolutely! NFA fights for faculty regardless of CBA status. We maintain an active presence at the legislature and give public comment at the Board of Regents. We fight for COLAs, higher ed budgets, better working conditions, protecting PERS and PEBP, and academic freedom across the state. Our legal defense services help faculty facing issues related to their jobs.

Perhaps most importantly at this moment is our affiliation to the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) and the American Federation of Teachers (AFT). AAUP is at the forefront of fighting overreach from the current federal administration (and any future administration that wants to hamstring academic freedom). From the courts to the streets, AAUP is organized to stop the assault on academic research, with successes to show for it.

I'm at a campus without a CBA. How are my worker's rights protected?

That depends, on a lot. Different institutions have their own practices and places where policies live. Some academic units have bylaws with some policies, while other policies live in administrative manuals or other rule books (names of these things vary by campus). Depending on the structure of the institution, you might have department bylaws, college bylaws, university bylaws, AND all of the NSHE Board of Regents Code and Policy rules and regulations on top of other policies and requirements from your institution's administration. Depending on how frequently any of these are updated, they might conflict or need extra interpretation (typically by the President, Chancellor, or their (legal) designee).

We know that these processes can have varying impacts. We know that some grievance processes have failed faculty at some institutions. NFA works with faculty at EVERY campus, but without the protections of a contract, we can’t guarantee that we can be by your side (for instance in a disciplinary meeting). That would require a CBA to enforce what are called Weingarten Rights.

What’s the difference between forming a union and getting a collective bargaining agreement?

Forming a union is a right, protected by the US constitution, as well as domestic and international law. Unions are a vehicle for speech, peaceful assembly, and petition, all First Amendment rights. Public sector unions are recognized in Nevada law, and many public sector employees in Nevada enjoy collective bargaining rights (including teachers and law enforcement).

Forming a union is NOT the same as having a collective bargaining agreement, or contract, however. That requires both the workers and the employers to agree to terms. Currently, faculty in the NSHE system have a limited right to collectively bargain. It’s given to us by our employers, and has been in NSHE Policy since the 1970s (although the first bargaining unit to form was in the early 1990s at TMCC). This is the basis on which our three collective bargaining chapters have their contracts.

Most public sector workers in Nevada (most city, county, and state workers like firefighters and law enforcement and our Classified staff colleagues at NSHE) have their rights in statute (law). Not only is that a higher level of protection (management can’t pull the rug out from under them) but it also authorizes things that NSHE policy cannot. These workers can take issues to the Government Employee-Management Relations Board for final decisions. Under our current system, the final decision is with the Regents. Public sector workers can also use tools like arbitration if they reach an impasse with management. If faculty reach an impasse the decision goes to…you guessed it, our bosses!

That’s why the NFA is working to enshrine a right to collectively bargain in Nevada statute. Right now, our Collective Bargaining Bill is going before committees in the Nevada Legislature. If it passes and is signed by the Governor (big if, he vetoed it last time) professional, unclassified workers (basically, faculty, LOAs, and graduate assistants) would gain the right to collectively bargain in statute. Our rights would be more secure, with better outcomes both for chapters that already collectively bargain, and those who might want to in the future. 

What about ‘Right to Work’ I thought that meant there are no unions in Nevada?

Not only does Nevada have unions, it has had a higher percentage of unionized workers than the US average for over 30 years! Nevada is a union state in many ways. Right to Work is a fairly narrow law. It states that workers can’t be compelled to pay union dues, or make union membership a requirement of employment. Often times, this means unions have to protect workers whether they pay their dues or not. Of course, we’d always rather workers see the value of their union and pay their dues willingly. Right to work laws have no impact on your right to gather together with your colleagues to make improvements in your workplace.

The NFA will continue its decades-long advocacy at the Legislature in the 2025 session that began on February 3rd, as the independent voice for faculty and other professional employees of Nevada's public colleges and universities.  

Here are our highest priorities as approved by the NFA State Board, first the legislative bills we are supporting followed by budget priorities:

Legislation

For Better Higher Education Management: Collective Bargaining Rights! (AB 191)

• Provide collective bargaining rights for NSHE professionals. The 7,200 NSHE rank-and-file faculty are the largest group of public employees in Nevada without collective bargaining regulations in state law.
• Three community colleges have organized to collectively bargain and graduate student workers have rallied support for unionizing.
• Under the current system, management at NSHE dictates the terms of bargaining. NSHE employee associations should have the right to use the Employee-Management Board like other public employees in Nevada.
• The ability to have a say in working conditions leads to better teaching, better student outcomes, and more effective shared governance. Faculty working conditions are student learning conditions!

For Better Higher Education Governance: Mandatory Board of Regents Training!

• Require training for Regents on policy, budgets, open-meeting laws, nondiscrimination, student life, and shared governance to improve Regent knowledge and decision-making.
• While voters retained the Board of Regents as the constitutional higher education governing body, training will promote effective governing and oversight.
• Nevada requires training for K-12 Trustees. NSHE Regents should be equally responsible and accountable to citizens.

Benefits for State Employees Now AND When They Retire: Restoring Retiree Health Benefits! (AB 188)

• Restore retiree health benefits for state employees hired after 2011 and make benefits for Medicare and non-Medicare retirees equitable.
• Nevada state employees who were hired after the Great Recession deserve the same benefits as those hired in good economic years.
• Retiree health benefits for state employees are needed to compete with other Nevada public employers. Reward state public service with retiree benefits.

Budget Priorities

Invest in Campus Safety

• NFA supports NSHE’s ask for both one-time and ongoing funding for critical security to keep our campuses open and serving the public. We must update safety and security so that senseless violence may never again shatter our community. GovRec funding is 72% below what NSHE estimates is necessary.

New Funding Formula

• NFA welcomes changes to the funding formula to support wrap-around services to students, with phased-in implementation to ensure no institution takes a budget cut in the transition.

Full Funding of Cost-of-Living Adjustments for State-Supported NSHE Budgets

• Prior to 2019, NSHE COLAs were funded at 80% (as most other state agencies), but were funded at about 64% since then.
• The cost that isn’t covered by the state is largely covered by student fees--lower state funding means shifting the burden to students or having fewer faculty and course sections to support their education.

5% + 3% Cost-of-Living Adjustments for State Employees

• To maintain current take-home pay after the retirement contribution increase (1.75% on 7/1/2025) and inflation running over 2.5%, COLAs for state employees of 5% FY2026 and 3% in FY2027 are required.
• The purchasing power of salaries for NSHE faculty continues to fall, which means losing top-quality faculty to other states that invest in higher education professionals.

Contact: Kent Ervin, NFA Director of Government Relations, Kent.Ervin@NevadaFacultyAlliance.org

Contributed by Ian Hartshorn, Ph.D., UNR-NFA

The Nevada Faculty Alliance notes with concern the decision of the new administration to freeze all meetings, travel, communications, and hiring within the National Institutes of Health (NIH) until approved by new political appointees.  These actions have a chilling effect on vital academic research that not only serves to protect the health of the American people but generates significant economic benefit to our state.

The NIH is a part of the US Department of Health and Human Services and serves as the nation’s medical research agency. The agency has an annual budget of more than $47 billion dollars and runs multiple programs important to academic training and research across the country.

The Nevada System of Higher Education (NSHE) is the largest recipient of NIH Grants in Nevada. NIH awards exceed $30 million in the state, supporting 977 jobs and generating over $200 million in economic activity. A politicized slow-down of these vital funds will harm researchers, universities, and our state.

Early reports suggest that the Trump Administration may seek to use NIH funding as a bargaining chip for other desired reforms of the country’s higher education system. The NFA rejects further politicization of academic research. Grants from the NIH undergo a rigorous review process, a process now halted for political intervention. Grants should be funded by scientific merit, not by a political litmus test.

The Nevada Faculty Alliance calls on our Nevada Congressional delegation to exercise their responsibility of budget oversight, and our Senators’ constitutional obligation of advice and consent on presidential appointments to ensure that the new administration’s decisions align with the NIH mission and broader goals of academic integrity and freedom.

The NFA stands with any researchers impacted by these decisions, and encourages campus administration, the NSHE regents, and state leaders to do all they can to encourage a timely resumption of vital NIH programs. We encourage education professionals to register their objections with the White House, and your representatives in Congress.

We urge all NFA members who might be impacted by the NIH activity suspensions, or who are aware of their effects on peers and students, to share their experiences and the extent of these impacts by submitting impact statements to their NFA Chapter Presidents. This information is vital for our NFA representatives to effectively communicate the adverse effects and repercussions of the NIH suspensions to our federal and state officials, as part of our ongoing advocacy efforts for our faculty and NSHE institutions.

Sources

https://www.science.org/content/article/trump-hits-nih-devastating-freezes-meetings-travel-communications-and-hiring

https://www.unitedformedicalresearch.org/nih-in-your-state/nevada

https://www.aaup.org/news/statement-aaup-president-todd-wolfson-national-institutes-health-freeze