On October 1, 2021 that UFF-UF bargaining unit ratified Part 1 of a Memorandum of Understanding covering the impacts of COVID on faculty working conditions. The MOU’s main provisions are as follows:

General

1. UF will share the State University System’s criteria for determining if and when research, service, and instructional activities will return to exclusively remote modalities.

Teaching and Work Assignments

2. Faculty with face-to-face teaching assignments for Fall 2021 may submit a physician’s updated note to UF indicating a change in their health status that requires a shift to remote instruction. UF will then re-evaluate the faculty member’s assignment and, with the faculty member’s permission, consider transitioning their classes to a remote modality.
3. Faculty with health concerns or family responsibilities may explore alternative schedules and work locations with their chair or director.
4. The University will provide faculty with their Spring 2022 teaching assignment, including the modalities of their teaching assignment, by  November 24, 2021. 
5. The move to new course modalities shall not set precedent for future instructional assignments or course offerings. 

COVID Safety

6. The University shall provide at least two (2) N-95 or KN-95 equivalent masks to each faculty member providing face-to-face instruction or interacting with students or the public. Faculty may receive up to 20 masks per month.
7. The University shall ensure transparent and frequent UF COVID indicator reporting, including daily updates on such measures as cases and isolation/quarantine of UF Affiliates.
8. Your union continues to bargain further items empowering faculty to remote teach, or institute mask, vaccine or testing requirements in their in-person classroom  as Part II of a Fall 2021 MOU.  

Intellectual Property

9. Following the provisions of Article 22.4 of the 2021-2024 Collective Bargaining Agreement, Faculty continue to have exclusive ownership rights for all instructional materials and lectures recorded/hosted on UF Zoom, Canvas, Mediasite course capture or other similar platforms. 

Service Responsibilities

10. All service-related responsibilities will take place in a remote modality unless those activities require a faculty member’s physical presence on campus.

Tenure and Promotion

11. Tenure and Promotion meetings may be conducted remotely; T&P voting must be conducted using the UF Voting application (http://tss.it.ufl.edu/uf-voting)

Performance Evaluations

12. Chairs and directors will include a statement in faculty members’ letters of evaluation acknowledging the pandemic’s continued negative impacts on teaching and research.
13. Faculty may submit a separate document as part of their annual activity report, as well as their Tenure and Promotion packets, describing the pandemic’s adverse impacts on their work.
14. Any comparison of Fall 2021 courses against +QM standards will not negatively impact evaluations of faculty instructional performance unless explicitly commissioned to produce courses that meet the +QM standards.

While some of the MOU’s provisions introduce new University policy, most simply codify plans that UF has already announced. Please read the full MOU for details.

This MOU modifies the  2021-2024 Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA). Except for modifications associated with this MOU, all terms and conditions of the 2021-2024 CBA remain in effect.