University of Illinois Springfield professors, both active and retired, and students formed a picket line Tuesday morning as members of the instructors’ union went on strike.
Meanwhile, many students roamed the campus wondering how the remaining few days of the spring semester will play out, with final exams scheduled to start next week and graduation day coming May 13.
“My thoughts are in support of the faculty, but at the same time, I feel it’s kind of bad timing with finals week going on and a lot of the stress the students are under,” said Crystal Summerrise, a 19-year-old UIS freshman from Chicago.
“The cancellation of class has kind of put us at a halt.”
University of Illinois Springfield United Faculty, the union that represents 168 tenured and tenure-track professors, announced Monday night they were going on strike after a seven-hour bargaining session earlier in the day didn’t produce an agreement.
Jon Welton, a 20-year-old freshman from the Decatur area, read the signs and wondered why the professors didn’t stay in the classroom and teach.
“If you look at this from the outside, if you are here for the students, I feel that you would be teaching and fighting your battle on your own time,” Welton said. “If you’d rather be teaching, nobody has required you to come out here and protest. You could be teaching your class, in my eyes.”
This story appeared in The State Journal-Register on May 2, 2017.
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