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Higher Education

Making Campuses Platforms For Labor Renewal

March 21, 2023 Joseph A. McCartin, CounterPunch.org. , , , ,
Everywhere you look this spring, you’ll find evidence that campuses are becoming sites of labor organizing and struggle.  In recent months, faculty at the University of Illinois at Chicago staged recently a successful week-long strike, adjunct faculty at the New School won a three-week strike, 50,000 graduate assistants staged a six-week strike across the entire University of California system, staff at American University struck, and undergraduate workers at a growing number of campuses have begun organizing unions and, in some places, even preparing to strike.   And this is just a small sampling of what has been afoot.

Title VI Complaint Filed Against George Washington University

March 20, 2023 Jessica Buxbaum, Mintpress News. , , , ,
Last month, a Palestinian rights group filed a federal complaint against George Washington University (GW), alleging the institution allows discrimination against Palestinians to persist unabated on campus. Palestine Legal filed a federal complaint with the United States Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights, demanding it investigates what the organization describes as a “years-long, hostile environment of anti-Palestinian racism.” The legal rights group is representing three students who say they have experienced anti-Palestinian discrimination from fellow classmates, professors, administrators, and GW Hillel, a Jewish campus organization.

Temple’s Graduate Worker Strike Ends With Important Victories

March 19, 2023 Jason Koslowski, Left Voice. , , , , , ,
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania - It’s official. The Temple University Graduate student Association (TUGSA) has voted; and by a margin of 344-8, the six-week-long strike of grad workers in Philadelphia is over. It ended in important victories. As a teacher looking in from the outside — I’m an adjunct in the faculty union here at Temple — it seems to me one of the most important wins is: TUGSA defeated a brutal anti-union campaign. Early on in the strike, Temple’s administrators stripped grad workers of healthcare and tuition remission. They returned healthcare to the workers before the strike even ended, a sign that the bosses saw they were losing.

From Georgetown To Langley

March 15, 2023 Alan MacLeod, Mintpress News. , ,
If you have ever wondered, “where do America’s spies come from?” the answer is quite possibly the Walsh School of Foreign Service (SFS) at Georgetown University. It is only a modestly-seized institution, yet the school provides the backbone for the Central Intelligence Agency, Department of Defense, State Department, and other organs of the national security state. From overthrowing foreign governments and conducting worldwide psychological operations to overseeing drug and gun smuggling and a global torture network, the CIA is perhaps the world’s most controversial and dangerous organization.

Dispatches From The Pickets: Temple Grad Worker Strike Escalates

March 3, 2023 Jason Koslowski, Left Voice. , , , ,
The contrast is sharp: dull gray clouds over bleak college buildings versus the bright intensity across TUGSA picketers’ faces. It’s week five of the grad worker strike. Someone says to me: “We’re doing another ‘hard picket’ today. We did it yesterday and stopped packages getting delivered.” I don’t know what that means but I’m not going to miss it. Some background. The UPS Teamsters here in Philly are refusing to cross the pickets and they’re not delivering packages. My own union could learn from this. The Teamsters’ supervisors are scabbing. They’re picking up and delivering packages at the Student Center.

Largest First-Contract Wins In 25 Years At Two New Mexico Universities

February 4, 2023 Gauge Burnett, United Electrical. , , ,
New Mexico - Following ratification of first contracts by members of UE Local 1466-United Graduate Workers at the University of New Mexico and UE Local 1498-Graduate Workers United at New Mexico State University, thousands of graduate workers in the state are now covered by collective bargaining agreements. Both locals joined UE in historic “card check” drives at the beginning of the pandemic and have overwhelmingly ratified first contracts in mid-December, earning 7.12 percent and 6.8 percent raises, respectively, for their members. Covering more than 2,500 workers, these are the largest first contracts settled by UE in the last 25 years. The union organizing discussed for decades by UNM graduate workers finally took shape in the spring semester of 2020. A group of graduate workers reached out to UE and hit the ground running as the pandemic exacerbated the unfair treatment and poor working conditions that existed at UNM.

Chicago Grads Want To Turn City Into A ‘Powerhouse Of Organizing’

February 1, 2023 Sara Van Horn, In These Times. , , ,
Chicago's thousands of graduate workers — increasingly responsible for teaching and research work once performed by faculty — have long been overworked, underpaid, and non-union. This month, that might finally be starting to change. On January 12, nearly 3,000 graduate workers at Northwestern University announced a landslide victory in their union election, winning 93.5% of the vote. This Tuesday, some 3,000 graduate workers at the nearby University of Chicago (UChicago) will also cast ballots, and while UChicago’s election results won’t be tallied until March due to mail-in voting, a majority of workers pledged to vote ​“yes.” The two universities are the largest employers of graduate workers in Chicago, and union victories at both would reflect a dramatic increase in the area’s academic union density.

Students Protest Fossil Fuel Involvement In Campus Career Center

January 15, 2023 Last Real Indians. , , ,
Washington - UW students are protesting on campus to demand that the UW Career and Internship Center amend their employer user policy to prohibit companies in the Fossil Fuel industry from recruiting on campus or using the center’s services in any capacity to engage with students. The requested change would deny members of the Fossil Fuel industry a space to recruit students through university networking platforms and career fair events, and also leverage the UW’s agenda-setting power by encouraging similar institutions to follow suit. After several meetings and an attempt to work with the executive director of the UW Career and Internship Center, Briana Randall, student members of the group Institution Climate Action (ICA) were met with strong refusal and told there was “absolutely no way” the career center would adopt such a policy.

The Higher Education Labor Movement Runs Full Speed Ahead Into 2023

January 14, 2023 Olivia Wood, Left Voice. , , , ,
At the end of 2022, workers in higher education had their eyes turned toward the weeks-long strikes at the University of California (UC) and The New School. These strikes were among the largest and longest that higher education in the U.S. has ever seen. In California, the striking unions represented about 48,000 workers. While the total number of striking faculty at The New School in New York was much smaller, they represented 87 percent of all teaching faculty at the university, showing the power of what a near-total shutdown of classes can do. These strikes are part of a much bigger trend in the higher education labor movement, which has grown significantly in the last decade, with 144 new private sector faculty and/or graduate student bargaining units forming just between 2013 and 2019, and many more filing for elections in the public sector and in the years since then.

Yale Graduate And Professional Student Workers Vote To Unionize

January 11, 2023 Megan Vaz, Yale Daily News. , , ,
In a landslide victory, Yale’s graduate and professional student workers have voted to unionize, marking a historic first after decades of organizing on campus. According to the National Labor Relations Board’s final tally, 1,860 of 2,039 voters favored forming a collective bargaining unit under Local 33 – UNITE HERE, the graduate student union that has fought for University recognition since 1990. Daily Union Elections, which tracks NLRB records, listed Local 33’s election filing as the second largest in the nation in 2022, with 4,000 graduate and professional workers eligible for union representation. Including challenged ballots that went uncounted due to wide vote margin, about two-thirds of those eligible to vote showed up to the polls or mailed in ballots.

The New School’s Quest For Community Self-Governance

January 10, 2023 Trebor Scholz, Resilience. , , ,
Established more than a century ago, The New School was set up in New York City as a haven for academic freedom and intellectual inquiry. As a private, progressive, research university, it now has five divisions – design, liberal arts, performing arts, social research, and public engagement – and is home to the Platform Cooperativism Consortium. Founded on the principles of community self-governance and social justice, The New School, through a historic strike fueled by the solidarity of its faculty, students, and staff, has secured better pay and health insurance for its part-time faculty. Though the strike has ended, the echoes of its impact continue to reverberate through the halls of the university.

Biggest Academic Strike In US History Continues

December 4, 2022 Surangya, People's Dispatch. , , , ,
After over two weeks of the largest higher education strike in US history, postdoctoral employees and academic researchers at the University of California have reached a tentative agreement with the UC system. The agreement will lead to significant wage increases, one of the key demands of the striking workers. However, these university employees will continue the strike action in solidarity with the 36,000 graduate student employees whose demands are yet to be met.After over two weeks of the largest higher education strike in US history, postdoctoral employees and academic researchers at the University of California have reached a tentative agreement with the UC system. The agreement will lead to significant wage increases, one of the key demands of the striking workers. However, these university employees will continue the strike action in solidarity with the 36,000 graduate student employees whose demands are yet to be met.

UC Faculty Announce Work Stoppage

November 29, 2022 UC Faculty Pledge of Solidarity. , , ,
Hundreds of faculty across the system have committed to solidarity with the UAW strike against Unfair Labor Practices by the University of California, recognized by the Public Employment Relations Board. We support the four striking units’ demands for wages adequate to their cost of living, workplace and community safety, disability justice, and other fundamental issues. We recognize that, while education should be the University’s main mission, its core product is accreditation, which means degrees, which means grades. 48,000 academic workers across the UC have been on strike since November 14th, 2022. This includes UAW 5810, UAW2865, and SRU-UAW, representing Postdocs, Academic Researchers, Graduate Student Researchers, Trainees, Fellows, Graduate Student Instructors, Readers, and Tutors.

Over 100,000 Education Workers Strike In The United Kingdom

November 27, 2022 WSWS. , , ,
Tens of thousands of university workers at 150 universities began three days of strikes on Thursday against low pay, intolerable workloads, insecure contacts and pensions cuts. A 48-hour strike by the University and College Union (UCU) members finished Friday, to be followed by a 24-hour strike and day of action on November 30. The strikes are the largest in history of higher education, with workers out at every UK institution. Also striking are support staff, members of the Unison and Unite unions, demanding better pay and conditions. Thursday’s strike was held the same day that up to 50,000 teachers in Scotland walked out in their first national strike since the 1980s against pay restraint by the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities and Scottish National Party devolved government. Educational Institute of Scotland (EIS) members rejected—with inflation now running at 14.2 percent—an initial 5 percent pay offer and a revised offer of 6.85 percent for the lowest-paid teachers.

Jazz Musician Esperanza Spalding To Depart Harvard

November 25, 2022  Paton D. Roberts and Eric Yan, Harvard Crimson. , ,
Prominent jazz musician Esperanza E. Spalding, a professor of the practice in Harvard’s Music Department, will depart the University, she announced in an email to department affiliates this week that was obtained by The Crimson. Spalding wrote in the email that she has communicated with Harvard over “many months” about a proposal for a “decolonial education” curriculum she would like to implement as a course or initiative, but said what she aspires “to cultivate and activate in organized learning spaces is not (yet) aligned with Harvard’s priorities.” A five-time Grammy award winner, Spalding joined the Music Department as a part-time professor of the practice in 2017 and has taught courses on songwriting, performance, and musical activism.
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