Faculty at Pratt Institute are celebrating the resounding ratification of a contract that continues a pattern of steady gains, especially for part-timers.

Nearly 90 percent of the voting members approved the new agreement May 23 for the United Federation of College Teachers. UFCT represents more than 900 faculty and librarians. Among the gains are medical benefits for part-time, tenure-track faculty.

Pratt, a NYSUT private higher education local in Brooklyn with a national reputation as an arts college, draws heavily upon the talents of local professionals for its 750-member part-time faculty, said UFCT President Kye Carbone.

The college has granted tenure for part-time faculty since its first agreement in 1972, a condition that Carbone called "revolutionary" at the time, and remains almost unheard-of today.

The full-time Pratt faculty numbers 103. Part-time faculty are classified either as "adjuncts," with academic rank and eligibility for a certificate of continuous employment, (the part-timer's equivalent of tenure); or as "visitors," who work fewer hours and are not eligible for the certificate of continous employment.

"The last contract in 2003 was really a breakthrough, and we've been able to build on that," said Carbone, who attributed the union's growth to vigilant enforcement of the contract and old-fashioned outreach to new faculty to encourage them to join.

The new agreement is retroactive to the fall of 2007 and runs through the fall of 2011.

— Darryl McGrath