Eight UF faculty members have filed grievances against the UF administration concerning faculty layoffs and program mergers.
A grievance is a formal complaint claiming that a right has been violated.
The content and the names of those faculty who filed the grievances are confidential, wrote Kyle Cavanaugh, UF vice president for administration, in an e-mail.
The eight faculty grievances, filed throughout July, are from faculty targeted for layoffs, denied the right to apply for tenure or "arbitrarily and capriciously" reassigned, according to a Thursday statement from the United Faculty of Florida, a union that represents about 35 percent of UF's faculty.
The union also filed a grievance against the administration on July 21.
John Biro, president of the union's UF chapter, said the union filed its grievance concerning program mergers in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.
Throughout the summer, the administration's behavior has been marked by "secretiveness, hypocrisy, manipulation and misrepresentation," according to the union's statement.
It states the administration has rejected revenue-neutral alternatives to budget cuts, disproportionately targeted women and minorities for layoffs and made "major changes" to academic programs without adequate faculty consent.
Biro said he hopes a discussion with administrators will lead to some kind of compromise. Otherwise, a formal hearing will be held.
"I am not optimistic that (compromise) will happen because there is really no room for compromise when you are laid off," Biro said. "You are or you aren't."
