When UUP President Phil Smith addressed members attending the union’s Fall New Leadership Workshops, he was quick to thank them for their participation.

Then he cut to the chase.

“We are going to ask a lot of you as union leaders,” Smith told the more than 50 UUPers enrolled in workshops at the Fort William Henry Resort in Lake George in late October. “We need your help to stop further cuts to SUNY. We need you to get your members involved and active in UUP. We need you to be the face of UUP at your chapters.”

Smith acknowledged that the union expects a lot from its leaders; the leaders, in turn, should expect that the union will provide them with the training needed to get the job done.

UUP’s series of leadership training sessions do exactly that, Smith said.

“Our workshops are designed to give you the tools you need to tackle the issues, and to educate and activate your union colleagues,” he added.

Workshop topics ranged from communicating with members and UUP: The Organization, to collective bargaining, employment security, and creating workplace civility. The workshops were conducted by NYSUT labor relations specialists assigned to UUP and other NYSUT and UUP staff members.

The newest leaders enrolled in UUP: The Organization, which provided an overview of the organizational structure, functional relationships and activities of the union. Among the skills they learned were how to effectively engage in local political action and how to build campus/community coalitions.

Communicating Through Newsletters and Websites was an interactive, two-part workshop that included writing and design tips, as well as techniques for creating chapter-based websites.

Manners Please: Conquering Bullying and Creating Civility in the Workplace was a new session to help members identify bullying behaviors and use available approaches to resolve the problem.

Many of the leaders who attended the spring workshops enrolled this time around in Collective Bargaining and the Taylor Law, which provided an overview of the Public Employees Fair Employment Act.

“We are a union,” Smith stressed. “We have common goals, common aspirations and a common future. … We can accomplish anything if we do it together.”

— Karen L. Mattison