http://www.freep.com/article/2012121...text|FRONTPAGE

Wayne State University's faculty has authorized the union leadership to call a strike against the university at any time as negotiations over a new contract drag on."A strike authorization is not a strike," union president Charles Parrish, a political science professor, said Monday. "It's a notification to the other side that things are very serious."

The two sides are scheduled to talk again Friday.

That said, union officials said they would be willing to call for the strike, if needed, although any such call likely would not come until the beginning of the winter semester in January.

University spokesman Matt Lockwood declined to comment Monday on the move.