In the late 1970s UUP faced the most serious challenge to its position as bargaining agent from the New York Educators Association, an affiliate of the National Education Association. UUP disaffiliated itself from the NEA in 1976. The NEA/NYEA challenge culminated in an election for bargaining agent conducted by the New York State Public Employment Relations Board in December 1978. Through much of 1978, UUP campaigned for its continuation as bargaining agent for SUNY faculty and non-teaching professionals, with the assistance of professional organizers from the AFT and NYSUT field representatives.
This series is an artificial gathering of NEA/NYEA challenge materials found during the course of processing the collection. The primary records are the "excelsior listings" (poll lists) used during the representation election ballot count conducted on December 22, 1978. They give the names, addresses, and positions of every member of the UUP bargaining unit and the number of the ballot sent to each member. The excelsior listings are in order of the ballot numbers (which were assigned by chapter). The excelsior listings were also hand-marked to indicate who were members of UUP and from which individuals ballots were received to be counted. There are two copies of the ballot count excelsior listings. One set is organized into seventeen separate groups in 1,000 ballot intervals that were used at the actual counting tables, and include a list of the observers for UUP, NEA/NYEA, the State, and PERB for those ballots, instructions for UUP observers, and forms for UUP's observers to record challenged ballots. Although the excelsior listings do not indicate the vote made by each individual, they do provide a record of who voted in the challenge election and whether or not they were members of UUP. The excelsior listings also provide a snapshot of UUP's membership, and are the only records available in this collection that list the entire UUP bargaining unit further annotated as to who was a member of UUP. Also included in this series are campaign materials, the results of a pre-election Harris poll commissioned by UUP, and a series of news clippings regarding the challenge and election.
Other materials relating to the NEA/NYEA challenge, including correspondence detailing UUP's organizing activities during the campaign, can be found in the subject files of President Wakshull in Subseries 3.1 of Subgroup III; the records of UUP's Treasurer Joseph Drew in Subgroup V; and in the photographs and printed memorabilia in Subgroup VIII, Communications Department.