The ominous cloud of strike or lockout is looming over York University students with just days to go before the start of the institution's fall semester.

The York University Faculty Association (YUFA) is gearing up for potential strike action, or the possibility of being locked out by employers, claiming that the school's administration "threatened to unilaterally change the working conditions of its professors, librarians, and archivists that will degrade teaching, student learning and research."

YUFA members voted 92.3 per cent in favour of a strike mandate in late July, with the action potentially affecting 1,700 faculty members should it go forward. The union and the university have officially been in a strike or lockout position since August 2.

Classes for York University's fall semester kick off on September 4, just over two weeks away, as negotiations between YUFA and the school continue behind the scenes.

However, the clock is quickly ticking away, and negotiations have made little headway.

YUFA released a statement last week, with the association's president, Ellie Perkins, saying, "The last thing we want is to be on the picket line rather than in our classrooms."

"We're doing everything we can to get a fair deal that protects the quality of education we're able to offer our students," added Perkins.

YUFA argues that undergraduate class sizes have "emerged as a major issue for faculty and students." In one example, the association notes that "Recent restructuring at the university's Glendon and Keele campuses has increased the number of students in some classes tenfold."

Exacerbating these class size concerns, YUFA claims that four faculty members have been terminated in the last few weeks, while others are being encouraged to retire.

"Faculty care deeply about providing the best learning experience possible," said Perkins. "That's just not possible when you suddenly have ten times as many students."

YUFA members have also expressed concerns about the institution's building spree, with Vice President Internal, Art Redding, saying, "The university claims it has no money to maintain reasonable class sizes, but the Ontario Auditor General found that York is financially sustainable, with net assets of $1.9 billion at the end of 2022-2023."

"Meanwhile, the administration is pouring money into new buildings and projects instead of focusing on the fundamentals of teaching and learning," added Redding,

However, despite the worrying outlook last week, negotiations have continued in the days since, even resulting in some resolutions on the matter.

A marathon 11-hour bargaining session on August 17 resulted in the two sides reaching an agreement on what YUFA describes as "a few small items."

Negotiations continued from Sunday night into the early morning hours on Monday. YUFA's Bargaining Team again met with the mediator on Monday during the day, sending a revised settlement offer to the employer that afternoon and setting aside Tuesday afternoon for bargaining or a caucus meeting.

The ongoing strike threat comes months after 3,000 members of CUPE 3903, a union representing the school's teaching assistants, grad assistants, and contract professors, formed picket lines lasting almost two months over wages.

York University faculty last went on strike in 2018 in a 143-day job action that remains the longest strike in the history of Canadian post-secondary education.

UPDATE:

YUFA has announced that, in a mediated bargaining session that concluded just before midnight on Monday, a negotiated agreement was signed extending faculty's Collective Agreement until April 30, 2027.  

YUFA states that the wage settlement is 3.1% per cent in the first year, 2.85 per cent in the second, and 2.85 per cent in the third year of the agreement.