TSSU met with the employer for a fifth day of bargaining on September 16th. TSSU completed the presentation of all of our language proposals and answered all the questions posed by the employer's bargaining team. TSSU is now awaiting a reply on our package, which was originally tabled on June 4th, 2014. This package contains significant proposals which are designed to meet the current issues of our members on the ground and the future issues that will occur as SFU's instructional model evolves.

The employer has finally provided TSSU with an enunciation of most, but not all, of its proposals. TSSU's bargaining committee is now able to commence analysis and examination of the enunciated proposals. TSSU is still waiting for the employer's bargaining team to provide sufficient clarity, or produce actual contract language, on several items.

TSSU is committed to bargaining a new collective agreement that moves SFU forward, not backwards, in its treatment of Teaching Assistants, Tutor Markers, Sessional Instructors and ELC/ITP Instructors. TSSU's proposed package includes:

• a sustainable solution to the administrative problems of the childcare fund that gets money into the hands of parents,
  recognition of the importance of sessional instructors through a seniority system that values their teaching experience while allowing access to sessional positions for graduate students,
• construction of a ladder between sessional instructor positions and permanent teaching positions,
• improvements to benefits and working conditions for ELC/ITP instructors at Harbour Centre to mirror those of their administrative support staff colleagues,
• combination of the TA/TM language to get ahead of the ongoing merging and changing nature of the two jobs, and to address systemic workload issues in TA and TM contracts,
• changes to the TA/TM priority and job posting system to ensure graduate students have priority access to TA work,
• reasonable wage increases to keep up with the rising cost of living, along with benefit improvements.