Jeannie Ludlow, the president of Eastern’s chapter of University Professionals of Illinois, clarified points of the newly approved EIU-UPI contract at the Faculty Senate meeting on Oct. 16.

Ludlow said she has been getting questions about items in the contract that were not recently added and have actually been a part of lots of past contracts.

“Anytime that we get something, like a new contract, people start noticing things about their lives and their jobs that, perhaps, have been happening for a long time but that they hadn’t noticed before,” Ludlow said. “Sometimes things that people perceive to be new and different are actually not new and different, so I think that’s an important thing for us all to keep in mind.” 

One item that is changed from the past EIU-UPI contracts is the policy on non-compensable or non-payable sick leave.

Two aspects of this are different in the new contract.

One different aspect is how sick days are claimed and entered on PAWS; before, sick days were claimed by half-day increments, and now they are claimed by quarter hour increments.

There is also now a ceiling on how much non-compensable sick leave that faculty members can receive.

The ceiling for a typical 9 month faculty is 2250 hours, or a year and a half in State Employees’ Retirement System time.

This ceiling will be enforced this coming December, Ludlow said.

“On Dec. 1 of this year, any balance over 2250 that is in (faculty’s) non-payable sick leave account is going to be going away,” Ludlow said. “What we’re going to do, and what has not been done yet, is (we’re) reopening the sick leave bank sometime between now … and Dec. 1, so if (faculty) have over 2250 (they) can donate those hours before they just disappear, so at least (the hours) can go into the sick leave bank.”

Ludlow said some faculty members have also been confused over whether or not Annually Contracted Faculty are now required to do service on campus.

ACFs are still not required to, Ludlow said, but they can be involved if they want to be.

Office hour requirements have also been updated with the new contract, Ludlow said.

The new requirements are four hours over three days with increments being longer than 15 minutes for on-campus faculty.

The process for Professional Advancement Increases has also changed with this new contract.

Todd Bruns, Faculty Senate chair and scholarly communication librarian and institutional repository director, said this change is in rates and process.

“The first PAI is 7.5 percent; three years later you send a summary sheet to the Provost’s office, that’s 3.5 percent; every three years after that you apply for a PAI that’s 3.5 percent, and essentially every other one you’re doing a full portfolio,” Bruns said.

Ludlow said that faculty eligible for a full PAI this year will apply for 7.5 percent, while faculty who have recently done the full PAI may apply for the 3.5 percent.

Ludlow said there have also been misconceptions with parental leave policy.

Eastern uses sick leave days to pay for Family Medical Leave and Access, which Ludlow said is not contractual but is a policy through Internal Governing Policies.

Brooke Schwartz can be reached at

581-2812 or at [email protected].