United Campus Workers of Arizona - CWA Local 7065 (UCWAZ), and Community College Workers United (CCWU), represent faculty, staff, and students of University of Arizona, Arizona State University, and Northern Arizona University, and the Maricopa Community Colleges. We are organizing to resist the continued erosion of federal, public funding for higher education, moves to eliminate the Department of Education, and the increasing precariousness of campus workers. The perilous conditions facing higher education are rapidly worsening under the current federal administration and the unelected billionaires surrounding it. Our institutions face unprecedented challenges including:

• Attacks on academic freedom and free speech
• Funding cuts related to teaching and research
• Renewed threats to job security and wages of campus workers
• Threats to student financial aid and scholarships
• The dismantling of LGBTQ+ and Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (DEIA) protections
• Threats to non-citizens, visa holders, and international students and workers

These are only the beginning of a relentless campaign to dismantle higher education altogether. Regardless of rank or job title, all campus workers face increases in workload and/or the threat of being replaced by “contingent” workers who have less power to ensure students' safety and success. We must mobilize and stand together to reform and defend higher education and support all workers who participate in delivering this essential public good. We must recognize our working conditions are connected directly to our students’ learning conditions. Building power together is the only way forward. As educators, professionals and students, we are organizing collectively for renewed solidarity among all sectors and campuses.

As we confront the daily onslaughts on higher education and their impacts, UCWAZ and CCWU renew our calls on the Arizona Board of Regents (ABOR), Regent Governor Hobbs, and the Presidents and Provosts of University of Arizona, Arizona State University, and Northern Arizona University, the Maricopa Governing Board, Maricopa Community College District Chancellor, and College Presidents, to defend our campuses and stand up to the current White House administration’s alarming political campaign against higher education by:

1. Protecting academic freedom and freedom of speech on our campuses and opposing policies or legislation that repress teaching, researching, learning, and speaking about critical social and scientific issues;

2. Protecting the civil and human rights of international, non-citizen, and marginalized faculty and students;

3. Reinstating any websites, employee groups, student groups, or similar entities that directed workers and students to specific resources needed by their communities

4. Refusing to comply, and /or preemptively acquiescing with executive orders, especially while these orders are rightfully being contested in the courts by education advocates

5. Advocating alongside us to increase public funding for universities and community colleges to make education more accessible and ensure a stable work environment;

6. Enacting transparent budgetary solutions that preserve jobs;

7. Offering more multi-year appointments and raise the cap on the percentage of multi-year appointments for Contingent Faculty (Career Track, Faculty Associates, Adjuncts) at Arizona universities & community colleges

8. Equitably sharing resources and information among universities and with community colleges to ensure all institutions have what they need to safely and legally resist such federal directives

United we call for educators and staff at all levels and institutions, as well as the students and families we serve, to sign onto this petition in support of public education as a public good.