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Jo Schaffer is showing no signs of slowing down.
Although she retired in 1996 after 23 years as curator of visual resources at SUNY Cortland, the longtime UUP member hasn’t stopped working to better her union, the University and her community. It’s that kind of devotion that earned the admiration of Schaffer’s fellow retiree members, who have named her UUP Outstanding Retiree for 2008.
The award is given by the Committee on Active Retired Membership (COARM), which is the governing body for the union’s 3,300 retiree members. Schaffer has been involved with COARM in various capacities for the last two decades: she was COARM’s officer liaison when she served as UUP statewide membership development officer for all but two years between 1987 and 1997; was an elected COARM rep from 1999 to 2007; and is currently one of two presidential appointees. She will receive her award later this month during the union’s Fall Delegate Assembly in Albany.
“Jo truly understands what unions are about — improving the lives of all people who work for a living and advocating for social justice with determination, passion and, frequently, with her well-known humor,” said COARM Chair Judith Wishnia of SUNY Stony Brook. “Jo has worked all her professional life and now as a retiree to uphold these principles.”
Schaffer is an active member of the Alliance for Retired Americans, attending dozens of regional, state and national meetings each year on issues relevant to retirees. She is an outspoken critic of proposals to privatize Social Security and Medicare, and has worked tirelessly to protect the freshwater aquifers in Cortland County.
She is a frequent contributor to the union’s retiree newsletter. In the most recent issue of The Active Retiree, she summarized the first meeting of the New York State Rural Aging Summit, which she attended as a representative from UUP and NYSUT. She is currently working with Wishnia to compile results of a four-page survey to gauge the issues paramount interest to SUNY retirees.
Schaffer has been a NYSUT and AFT delegate since the mid-1980s, and she is credited with helping to form UUP’s Women’s Rights and Concerns Committee, with the late Mary Edwards of SUNY Purchase, in the early 1980s. The AFT Women’s Rights Committee recently honored Schaffer for 50 years of continuous union service.
Although she earned UUP’s Nina Mitchell Award for Distinguished Service in 1996, Schaffer admits her proudest accomplishment as a union member is being the first professional employee to be elected — and twice re-elected — as chapter president at Cortland. No professional member since has held the chapter’s top post.
— Karen L. Mattison