CIT online courses on hold amid row

A number of online courses at Cork Institute of Technology, which were due to start on Monday, look unlikely to go ahead on that day due to industrial action.

The Teaching Union of Ireland has said that its members will refuse to engage in either the delivery or development of the modules. Since March, the union and company have been at odds over the courses, with lecturers unhappy at inadequate training of staff and a failure to provide the extra time needed for teaching and interacting with students remotely online.

Last April, almost two thirds of more than 550 TUI members at CIT took part in a ballot on the issue. That resulted in a 90% vote in favour of industrial action. Negotiations continued but when there appeared to be no progress in sight the union announced industrial action to begin on September 1.

However, that was deferred to allow for further talks at the Labour Relations Commission yesterday. Those talks again failed to yield an agreement and the union said it was immediately beginning industrial action.

Neither the union nor management could give a figure for the number of courses or students who will be impacted by the action when the courses begin on Monday, although it is understood it may just be modules in cloud computing and civil engineering which will be directly impacted. However, it is anticipated the numbers impacted could rise significantly into the hundreds with more courses due to be rolled out from January.

“Unfortunately, CIT management has refused to consider resolving the additional workload requirements essential to fuel quality online delivery — workload requirements of key academic lecturing staff without whom this development cannot take place,” said June O’Reilly, TUI branch secretary.

A spokeswoman for the university said: “CIT have been engaged in lengthy and detailed consultation with TUI over the introduction of new online learning technology. CIT is willing to refer the matter to the Labour Court for determination and are disappointed that TUI has disengaged from the industrial relations process. We have invited TUI to a meeting tomorrow morning with a view to mitigating the direct impact on students and we would hope that TUI would co-operate to put the interest of our students first.”

Today, TUI members will stage a protest outside the university’s administration building at 1pm.