AFT-Wisconsin is the organization for higher education faculty and academic staff in Wisconsin. AFT-Wisconsin, the Wisconsin affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers, currently represents over 17,000 professional public employees in the state, including employees on every campus in the UW System.

The idea of a union for higher education professionals might seem counterintuitive at first. As faculty and academic staff, we do much of our work as individuals, work like teaching, research, student advising, writing and editing scholarly books and articles, lecture preparation, and collections management.

But there is much that we must work together to accomplish, such as working for improved state funding for salaries and benefits, securing a greater role for faculty and academic staff in campus decision-making, protecting academic freedom and tenure, and gaining greater job security for contingent employees.

AFT-Wisconsin already represents thousands of higher education employees, including graduate assistants at UW-Madison and UW-Milwaukee and technical college faculty and staff across the state. Through collective bargaining, these unions have been able to bargain for (and keep) regular raises, dramatically improve benefits, and increase job security for their members. Furthermore, these same employees are able to advocate for higher education with the state legislature, making their collective voices heard on crucial legislation.

Forming a collective bargaining union is the best avenue to having a strong, unified voice with the UW System and with the State of Wisconsin. Through shared governance, we have been able to provide input on many issues, but our input is strictly advisory; university and system administration can—and do—ignore it when they please.

Collective bargaining, however, empowers us to change our institutions for the better. Through our collective voices and a binding contract, we will be able to strengthen shared governance and will have concrete, direct influence on workload, salaries, job security, and professional advancement. 

There are currently four AFT-W locals representing faculty and academic staff and graduate employees in the UW System.  For more information on these locals, please click the appropriate link below:

MGAA (Milwaukee Graduate Assistants Association)
TAA (Teaching Assistants Association)
TAUWP (The Association of University of Wisconsin Professionals)
UFAS (United Faculty and Academic Staff)