Last month, the Athabasca University Faculty Association published an update on their website regarding job precarity for one of its members.
According to the update, Dr. Sabine Graf, a professor of computing and information systems at Athabasca University, is a parent of a child with fibular hemimelia, a congenital defect affecting the legs.
The child’s form of fibular hemimelia is too complex for treatment in Canada, which proposed simply amputating both legs.
There is a more advanced treatment in Austria, where Graf and her spouse are originally from. Their child would receive regular pediatric surgeries as he grows up in Austria, which would allow him to keep his legs.
Given that Athabasca University’s core content delivery is virtual, one would think this is something that could be easily accommodated. When I was taking economics classes from Athabasca in 2021, for example, my instructor was in Manitoba, not Alberta.
Graf and her family moved to Austria 5 years ago to accommodate the child’s health needs.
During this time, Graf has continued teaching and attending meetings virtually, despite the massive time difference. Despite several discussions prior to her leaving regarding accommodations, Graf had stopped hearing from the university.
Until now.
After years of silence, Athabasca University’s human resources department recently reached out to Graf to tell her that the would not hire an employer of record. This was one option they had discussed, and would have allowed a third-party to handle Sabine’s employment status and payroll in Austria.
The university told Graf, according to AUFA, that they denied her accommodating request because of “undue hardship” on their part, that “unspecified task risks” would be too great for them to bear.
This decision puts Graf in quite the predicament.
If she wants to keep her job with Athabasca University, she has to move back to Canada. She can move back with her family, but that would mean that her child’s legs would be amputated. She can move back alone, which means being away from her family or paying for exorbitant travel costs to visit them regularly.
Or she can stay in Austria and lose her job with Athabasca University altogether.
The AUFA claims that the university told Graf in June that they had stripped her of her AUFA membership, which is wild. Since when does an employer get to dictate who is and is not a member of a union?
Without her AUFA membership, Graf loses disciplinary protections in her collective agreement. Athabasca University has denied AUFA’s request for a meeting to discuss Graf’s situation.
Her loss of AUFA membership also threatens her research grants, including those who are employed using the funds from those grants. Her publications are also at risk, as is the incoming PhD program in computing and information systems.
Graf’s union is demanding that the university’s leadership restore her rights as a tenured professor, stop threatening to fire her, meet with AUFA, and explore all available options.
