First Name,
Welcome to the 2023 academic year! As we return from this Labor Day weekend, I want to share a few of the issues that you’ll be hearing about this year as we all work together to educate our students, advocate for our campuses and generally fight for a public higher education system that supports us all.
You’ve already seen messages come out about the Minnesota Transfer Curriculum (MNTC) review and revision process that will begin this year and last for the next few years. The MNTC lays out the structure that all of our general education programs fit into. Each of our campuses has different ways of fulfilling the MNTC, but we are all working within 10 goal areas and 40 credits that are shared across MinnState and accepted as a transferable general education package by the U of M and many private colleges in Minnesota. That massive system will be reviewed and re-envisioned. This first year will be focused on data collection with a Steering Committee that will be looking at general education programs at other institutions and systems and conducting listening sessions with students, faculty, and employers. This is a once in a career opportunity for us to work together and influence the future of higher education in Minnesota for the next generation and to collectively define what it means to be an educated person in the 21st century. Keep your eyes out for ways to get involved this year and beyond.
As you are all aware, our institutions have been struggling with enrollment challenges, pandemic expenses, and a Minnesota legislature that has not provided sufficient funding for public higher education. This year presents a unique opportunity—because of redistricting, every seat in the Minnesota House and Senate and all of Minnesota’s statewide offices (governor, lt. governor, etc.) are up for election. We need to support and elect candidates that will prioritize MinnState students in their funding decisions, helping us in our constant efforts to keep costs down for students and to maintain the high-quality programs we work in. I hope in the weeks between now and November, you will get involved by attending candidate forums, helping to register students to vote, learning about your local elections, and supporting the candidates who will support us. You’ll see information coming soon about ways to get involved so that we can rebuild a team of legislative allies to get us a fair share of the $9.3 billion surplus on the state’s plate.
Finally, as we watch a resurgence of union activism across multiple sectors and all geographic areas of the country, it is worth considering how each of us and our union, the IFO, fits into the history of the labor movement. Our next Delegate Assembly, in the spring of 2024, will kick off the celebration leading to our 50th anniversary as a union. While the IFO’s roots go decades further back to its origins in the 1930s, we officially voted to become a recognized public employee union in May 1975. There are events in the works to teach about and learn about the history of our union and the history of all unions over the next year. We have truly done groundbreaking work in Minnesota and looking back will fuel our future successes.
In that spirit, as a part of labor union history, I hope you enjoyed Labor Day. Take a moment this week to think about those who built what we have and how we can all continue to build it each and every year.
In Solidarity,
Jenna Chernega
IFO President