To join SJU-AAUP, go to AAUP.ORG/JOIN. Click “Join” and follow the instructions for “St. John’s.” A screen-shot walkthrough of the process here.

Why join SJU-AAUP?

SJU-AAUP is a member-led, transparent, and democratic union that runs on the input, skills, and brilliance of its members. As SJU-AAUP members, our goal is simple: Get the St. John’s administration back to recognizing our union and back to the contract bargaining table. Full-time and part-time faculty have made clear that our contract priorities are salaries that keep up with the cost of living, affordable healthcare, shared university governance, job security for part-time and contract faculty, and robust research support.

Our strategy to win is to build a supermajority faculty union, where most faculty are union members who are connected with their colleagues and who feel invested in shared priorities. This is how we build the power and leverage necessary to push the employer back to the table and win a better St. John’s for faculty, staff, and students alike. Join us!

What happens when I become an SJU-AAUP member?

When you join SJU-AAUP, you become part of a movement at SJU to build a supermajority of faculty who support re-recognition of our union and a return to the contract bargaining table. You also join a large movement of faculty nationwide who are negotiating strong contracts, forming new unions, and improving industry standards for faculty. 

Your SJU-AAUP membership includes the right to vote in all SJU-AAUP elections and to run for local chapter and national offices; opportunities to shape the priorities of the SJU-AAUP and to vote on key strategy decisions such as strike authorization; the power to strengthen our city, state, and national union affiliates; and access to extensive AFT member benefits and AAUP member benefits. 

What if I already paid chapter support?

If you previously paid what was known as SJU-AAUP “chapter support,” that will expire on September 1, 2026. SJU-AAUP is no longer collecting chapter support. Going forward, we simply ask all faculty to become SJU-AAUP members via the AAUP website.

Due to the highly unusual situation of having two unions represent our faculty bargaining unit, SJU-AAUP has had a complicated dues collection process. In the past, SJU-AAUP collected donations known as “chapter support” to pay for local chapter supplies, the chapter website, and legal fees. However, since late June, we have moved away from collecting chapter support and are instead asking faculty to join SJU-AAUP as members.

I am a member of the Faculty Association. Can I still join the AAUP? 

Most members of the Faculty Association are SJU-AAUP members and/or donors. For complicated historical reasons, St. John’s faculty have two separate unions that together represent faculty at the contract bargaining table. So long as faculty are represented by two unions, it is wise to be a member of both.  

How much are SJU-AAUP membership dues?

You can choose to pay union dues on a monthly or on an annual basis. Union dues for full-time faculty are $13.75/month or $165/year. Union dues for part-time faculty are $6.67/month or $80/year. That’s less than the monthly price of a Netflix subscription to build democratic power in your workplace and win back recognition of your union to advance the fair pay, healthcare, and job security we all need! If we can't afford $13/mo then we can't afford to not have an active union that fights for better compensation and better job security. 

What is SJU-AAUP’s strategy to regain recognition from SJU admin?

More active members = more power. Our strategy to win is to build a “supermajority faculty union,” where most faculty are union members who are connected with their colleagues and feel invested in shared priorities. This is how we build the power and leverage necessary to protect ourselves and the St. John’s that students need. With a supermajority, we have the leverage to escalate pressure--such as a massive rally, coordinated refusal to do non-compensated labor, or even a strike–to bring Fr. Shanley back to recognizing our union and back to contract bargaining.

How is SJU-AAUP building toward a supermajority?

To get to supermajority membership, we need many union members genuinely and confidently talking to our colleagues about the power of a union–for faculty, our families, our students, and our communities. SJU-AAUP members are currently having one-on-one conversations with colleagues to learn their concerns and priorities, strengthen relationships, and ask each colleague to join the SJU-AAUP. 

Would SJU-AAUP members ever go on strike?

A labor strike can only happen if SJU-AAUP members democratically choose that path through a formal vote called a strike authorization vote. To have the power required to even consider a successful strike authorization vote, let alone a successful strike action, a supermajority of faculty must affirm the power of being a union by becoming union members.

Can the administration see if I joined SJU-AAUP?

No. Union membership rosters are not shared with management and will never be shared without your consent. More importantly, the more faculty who join SJU-AAUP, the more protection we all have when we become members and take action together. 

I’m an adjunct/contract faculty member with little job security. Why should I join? 

Faculty in the most precarious jobs have the most to gain from union membership and the most to lose from not having a strong union that represents contract and part-time faculty interests. We, as a union representing ALL faculty, want to work together to win better job security and academic freedom for part-time and contract faculty members. The administration wants to keep part-time and contract faculty jobs insecure and to terminate these jobs at their whim. NOTE: If you teach at multiple colleges you can be a member of the AAUP chapter of each institution. 

Why can’t I just keep my head down and stay out of it? 

The more faculty members join our union the harder it is for administrators to take unethical actions against individual faculty and against our union. We create power and safety in numbers. Keeping your head down does not prevent administrators from targeting your department, program, or your own job security. It is easy for administrators to pick you off alone. However, joining the union builds strength with colleagues through solidarity. We have one another’s backs. Union members know from experience that this is the best way to keep administrators from taking arbitrary actions and to increase faculty security.

How long have faculty been unionized at St. John’s?

Over 56 years! St John’s faculty won our union and collective bargaining rights in 1970, the result of a fight that began in 1965 over low pay, poor benefits, and the administration’s refusal to give faculty a real say in governance. Unwilling to compromise, the administration fired 31 faculty members without due process for merely demanding to be treated as partners in the university’s mission. After the administration refused mediation or arbitration, the St. John’s faculty went on strike in January 1966, becoming the first college faculty to initiate a major strike action in the United States. The strike did not immediately lead to union recognition, but it forged a path to unionization to which the university agreed in 1970, when SJU-AAUP and the Faculty Association were established as the two official contract bargaining representatives of the St. John’s faculty bargaining unit. In the decades that followed union recognition, St. John’s University flourished. Our reputation for excellence in teaching and scholarship has soared, to the benefit of faculty and students alike. 

What is SJU-AAUP’s relationship to its national affiliate, the AAUP?

SJU-AAUP has benefited from tremendous support from our national organization, the American Association of University Professors, in the form of hefty legal grants, faculty organizing grants, campaign research, and countless hours of labor and training from union staff. We also benefit from the AAUP’s affiliation with the AFT, a large national union for education workers. Being part of the AAUP/AFT bridges St. John’s faculty with the national movement of faculty labor in a critical time for our university and for higher education workers under attack across the United States. Though our union is powerful nationally, and though AAUP members at other institutions have shown great solidarity with our struggle, we are the ones who will determine our future at St. John's. To build the power and leverage necessary to achieve our goals we must recruit a supermajority of St. John’s faculty to become members and active participants in the AAUP.

What did Father Shanley and Provost Moller do?

In February, we neared the settlement of a union contract after a year of negotiations. Then, President Father Shanley and Provost Møller, with help from the notoriously expensive and wasteful anti-union law firm Proskauer Rose, decided they would stop recognizing our faculty unions and stop respecting our legal right to collectively bargain contracts. Father Shanley and Provost Møller decided that if they break faculty unity, they can dictate our pay and healthcare, our conditions of work, how and when we are appointed and reappointed, and every administrative procedure without any meaningful faculty input into how their decisions impact research, students, or our Vincentian mission. The faculty handbook they provided in place of a collective bargaining agreement offers none of the protections of a union contract. They act as if they are above both New York State labor laws and ordinary human decency. They have lied about their reasons for violating the law, and they act as though they have no legal or moral obligation to engage with us as colleagues. If we intend to protect what St. John’s faculty built over six decades, we need to stand united against the autocratic, top-down governance model they are trying to impose.