On Nov 7th, 2025, ECUAD Human Resources (HR) launched the new RQW Portal. The RQW system will be replacing the ROFR system for the next hiring round (Summer 2026 and onwards).
All Sessional and Lecturer Faculty need to have profiles in the RQW Portal that accurately reflect the courses they are qualified to teach.
While the initial deadline for RQW application requests was Nov 21, we recommend faculty continue to submit course requests as soon as possible. Your requests could include courses you taught before, or courses you haven’t taught but believe you have the qualifications to teach. See the current timeline as proposed by the RQWSteering Committee here. Please note: you do not need to reapply each term unless you’ve gained new qualifications you’d like to add.
Please reach out to the FA Executive with any questions or concerns, either to this email ecuadfa@gmail.com or to our FA President Ben Unterman (benjamin.unterman@gmail.com). We also recommend you regularly check your @ecuad email for updates.
Some background information on the new RQW and QTT system:
The RQW (Right to Qualified Work) system is intended to replace the ROFR system and enable a more transparent and stabilizing hiring process for our Continuing (Lecturers) and Sessional faculty. The transition to a RQW system was a key issue in our last bargaining round (see Appendix XIII of our 2022-2025 Collective Agreement). The RQW system is comprised of two lists: A Seniority List, and a Qualified to Teach (QTT) list. Together these lists will guide Non-Regular and Continuing Faculty hiring and course allocation.
A brief summary of the work that has gone into the RQW portal so far:
- The RQW Portal was developed in-house by RQW Steering Committee, which is comprised of members from the ECUAD IT Team, HR, the Academic Provost, and the Deans. (Faculty were not included in RQW Steering Committee)
- The first Seniority List was shared with Non-Regular Faculty for feedback in Spring 2024;
- Regular Faculty have contributed a huge amount of labour populating the RQW Portal with with course-specific qualifications;
- Last Spring a few faculty and the FA Bargaining Team were invited to test the portal and submit feedback and questions.
While the launch of the RQW system has been long awaited, we know our faculty still has many concerns about the new system, concerns the FA Bargaining Team shares. We welcome all questions and feedback. Ensuring the RQW system is working as intended – enabling more hiring transparency and stabilization for our Non-Regular Faculty – is a process we are dedicated to improving, whether through clarifying tweaks to this existing portal or larger process changes through bargaining.
In solidarity,
FA Executive and Bargaining Committee