Ontario college faculty accept offer

New collective agreement averts a faculty strike

TORONTO, Feb. 24 /CNW/ - Faculty at Ontario's 24 colleges have accepted the colleges' final offer and will not be going on strike. The Ontario Labour Relations Board confirmed today that a 51.45% majority accepted the offer in a vote held across the province.

"We are pleased that faculty saw this offer as fair and reasonable and one that they could accept," said Dr. Rachael Donovan, chair of the colleges' bargaining team. "We will now have a collective agreement in place and we have avoided a strike. This result is good news for our students, our faculty and our communities."

The approved offer provides workload and salary improvements for faculty, including a 5.9 per cent salary increase that moves the maximum salary to more than $102,000 by September 1, 2011. The colleges' workload improvements include giving faculty more control over how workload is assigned.

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