UALE has recently begun an ambitious research project to investigate the political and financial status of labor studies and labor education programs at colleges and universities in the United States and Canada.
The project has a very short time line. The first report and presentation will take place at the November 13 Mid-Year UALE meeting in Washington, DC.
"In order to meet that deadline," says former UALE VP Helena Worthen, who is heading up the research effort, "I am going to have to do some shameless crowd-sourcing, which means help from you and others who have been paying attention to labor education."
Please help out by taking the 10-question Surveymonkey survey that you can access here.
Keep track of the progress of this project on our Research Project Page.
"A second piece of this project is capturing the current public discourse around labor, labor unions and labor education," according to Worthen. "This varies from place to place, from state to state. So, to help us contextualize what is going on with our programs, please keep your eyes open for how the media talks about labor that can give us a snapshot of what the public has in mind when we say 'labor' or 'labor education.'”
The purpose of this research project is to provide us with an accurate picture of what is going on, in order to develop a coherent international (US and Canada) strategy. We need a baseline picture of our wins, losses, threats and opportunities. We need to know the history of recent decades, to include programs that do not exist any more.
Says Worthen, "We have lost faculty, tenure lines, funding and supporters. We have experienced attacks from unexpected directions. We have seen bizarre distortions and misunderstandings circulate in the public discourse. We have also defended ourselves and created new programs. Right now we are asking if our experience simply part of the broader experience of the labor movement, as well as part of changes in higher education. Or, does labor education have a particular role to play in this story?"