The Status of Women at Canadian Universities and the Role of Faculty Unions

Introduction Women undergraduates now comprise more than 50% of students at Canadian universities; women academics, however, have yet to achieve employment and pay equity. Between 1987 and 2007 the proportion of full-time women university teachers holding tenured positions had more than doubled to 30%. However, only 20% of Full Professors teaching in Canadian universities are women (CAUT Almanac, 2009-2010; UWOFA, 2006). Currently, 41 universities in Canada have unionized faculty associations; and approximately 18 Faculty Associations have Status of Women and/or Equity committees (Rumelski, 2010). In addition to women who constitute the largest equity seeking group within Canadian universities, the other politically 'designated' equity groups: visible minorities, Aboriginal Canadians and persons with disabilities continue to be significantly under-represented within the Canadian academy. some notable progress in the past decade towards greater diversity, the Canadian academy remains largely white and male. (CAUT, 2010) Various attempts have been made at local, provincial and national levels to improve the representation and inclusion of these 'minorities' throughout the university hierarchy; change has, however, been predictably slow. This article will examine the role and contributions of faculty unions, and status of women committees, in helping women to achieve more equitable status within the Canadian academy. Part I: Slow But Steady.... Many volumes have been dedicated over the years to the status of women--and the place of feminists--within the academy. Some of the North American contributions to this discussion, from various disciplinary and experiential perspectives, include: Academic Women (Bernard, 1964), Coming of Age in Academe: Rekindling Women's hopes and reforming the Academy, (Martin, 2000), Breaking Anonymity: The Chilly Climate for Women Faculty, (The Chilly Collective, 1995), and York Stories: Women in Higher Education, (The York Stories Collective, 2000). Other collections such as: Teachers, Gender & Careers, (Acker, 1989) and Challenging Times: The Women's Movement in Canada and the United States (Backhouse and Flaherty, 1992) include chapters on women in higher education. Related to this discussion there have also been books on employment equity in Canada (Agocs and Burr, 1992) and the evolution of women's studies programs in Canadian universities (Braithwaite, Heald, Luhmann and Rosenberg, 2004). While there is some literature on women and the Canadian union movement (White, 1993; Yates, 2006), there is relatively little written on women and equity in relation to faculty unions. Statistics over the years show slow but steady progress as women make their way into and within Canadian universities. In 2007, the proportion of full-time women faculty grew to 34% (from 28% in 2001). This category includes tenure-track, tenured and limited term (contract) full-time faculty. The growth in women Full Professors in Canada has seen an increase from 15% in 2001 to just over 20% at the time of writing. Despite a series of pay equity studies and adjustments by 2007 the gender salary gap was still 88% across all ranks (UWO, 2009). At the same time there has been a continuing growth in the female student population with 58% at the Bachelor's level; 54% pursuing a Master's degree and 46% engaged in studies at the PhD level. Internationally, in countries sharing comparable university systems the proportion of male/female faculty is remarkably similar. In addition to overall representation, Canadian female faculty members are disproportionately distributed across major disciplines: Education = 49.9%; Fine Arts = 42.2%; Humanities = 41.3%; Health Professions = 39.5%; Social Sciences = 34.9%; Mathematics & Physical Sciences = 15.2%; Engineering & Applied Sciences = 12 % (CAUT Education Review, 2010, p.2). The distribution of women in the teaching ranks across disciplines declines predictably from the traditionally female dominated areas of Education, the Fine Arts and the Humanities, reaching something close to parity within the Health Professions (though even here there are disparities when comparing Nursing with Medicine, for example), and then declining precipitously in the Maths, Physical Sciences and Engineering. …

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