University of California

UCSF Health Professionals Charge Leadership With Complicity In Genocide

November 11, 2024 UC People’s Tribunal For Palestine, Mondoweiss. Resist! Accountability, California, Genocide, Health Professionals, Israel, Palestine, People's Tribunal, Student Activism, University of California

Almost a year ago, on October 31, 2023, faculty held a press conference in front of the Helen Diller Medical Center at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), in order to amplify the warnings of Palestinian colleagues at al-Ahli Hospital who predicted that Israel’s bombing of the hospital would be the first in a campaign that would decimate Gaza’s healthcare infrastructure. At the time, British-Palestinian surgeon Dr. Ghassan Abu-Sittah, addressing the world while standing among the dead, stated that Israel’s targeting of al-Ahli Hospital signaled a decisive shift, marking the moment when its assault on Gaza “stopped being a war, and became a genocide.”

University Of California Community Members Launch People’s Tribunal

November 8, 2024 The UC People's Tribunal for Palestine. Popular Resistance. Organize! Campus Movement, Palestine, People's Tribunal, Student Activism, University of California

Faculty, staff, and students of the University of California and concerned community members launched the UC People’s Tribunal for Palestine to hold their leadership–UC President Michael Drake, the UC Regents, and Governor Gavin Newsom–accountable for complicity in the devastation and destruction of the Palestinian people. Beginning on November 11, 2024, members of the UC community will assemble to charge UC leaders with direct and indirect complicity in genocide and Nakba, the ongoing process of dislocation, fragmentation, and mass killing that seeks to complete the work of erasing the existence of the Palestinian people that began in 1948.

A Judge Paused The University Of California Strike

June 19, 2024 Meghan McCarty Carino, Portside. Educate! California, Campus Movement, Labor Movement, Strikes, Unions, University of California

Thousands of graduate and postdoctoral student workers at six University of California campuses were back on the job this week after a judge ordered a temporary stop to their weekslong strike. They’re represented by the United Auto Workers union and initiated the rolling strike to protest the university’s handling of pro-Palestine protests. They also called for related charges and disciplinary actions against their members to be dropped. This temporary order allows for classes to wrap up but leaves some big questions unresolved. The University has charged that the strike was illegal because it violated the union’s current contract, according to Melissa Matella, associate vice president for labor relations at the UC.

University Of California Workers On Strike For Right To Protest For Gaza

May 29, 2024 Natalia Marques, People's Dispatch. Resist! California, Campus Movement, Gaza, Israel, Labor Movement, Palestine, Palestine Solidarity, Strikes, United Auto Workers (UAW), University of California, Worker Rights and Jobs

On May 28, 12,000 student workers organized under United Auto Workers Local 4811, working at the University of California – Los Angeles (UCLA) and UC Davis joined 2,000 union members already on strike at UC Santa Cruz. Workers representing United Auto Workers Local 4811 received a standing ovation at the People’s Conference for Palestine this past weekend, in honor of the union local taking the bold step in leading the first ever strike in US history in relation to Palestine solidarity. At the panel entitled “The Role of Labor Unions in the Palestinian Struggle,” workers received a standing ovation and chants of “UC, UC hear our call! 4811 will strike you all!”

University Of California Student Workers Begin Historic Political Strike

May 22, 2024 Olivia Wood, Left Voice. Resist! California, Campus Movement, Genocide, Israel, Palestine, Palestine Solidarity, Repression, Strikes, Student Activism, University of California

On May 20, University of California (UC) student and postdoc workers at the Santa Cruz campus began a historic strike against the repression of the student movement. UAW 4811, which represents over 48,000 workers, voted last week to authorize a strike in response to intense repression unleashed against students and faculty protesting for Palestine. Administrators at several University of California campuses invited in the police, who violently arrested and injured students, faculty, and staff. Many workers and students across the UC system also face disciplinary action from their universities, including suspension.

How UC Researchers Began Saying No To Military Work

May 20, 2024 Isabel Kain and Becker Sharif, Labor Notes. Resist! Academic Research, California, Israel, Palestine, Repression, Strikes, University of California, weapons, Worker Rights and Jobs

Our union of 48,000 academic workers has just authorized a strike over the University of California’s unfair labor practices in repressing peaceful protest, retaliating against members for protesting, and prohibiting pro-Palestine speech at the worksite. United Auto Workers Local 4811 announced the results yesterday: with nearly 20,000 members voting, 79 percent voted yes. Part of the groundwork behind this vote and informing the potential strike is the organizing we have done over the past several months in our science departments—as researchers who are no longer willing to support genocide with our labor.

Twenty Police Departments Dismantle UCI Palestine Solidarity Encampment

May 19, 2024 David Pulido, Fight Back! News. Resist! Campus Movement, Police, Repression, Student Activism, University of California

Irvine, CA – At least 20 police departments besieged the University of California, Irvine Gaza solidarity encampment on May 15, as student protesters marked the anniversary of the 1948 Nakba. Earlier that morning, protesters reclaimed UCI Physical Sciences Lecture Hall and renamed it in honor of Alex Odeh, a Palestinian American activist who was assassinated in Santa Ana, California in 1985 by three members of the Jewish Defense League. Shortly after students draped banners on Alex Odeh Hall, 20 Orange County police departments swarmed the campus parking lots as UCI administration put out a call for “mutual aid.”

University Of California Workers Vote To Authorize A Strike

May 17, 2024 Natalia Marques, People's Dispatch. Resist! Campus Movement, Repression, Solidarity, Strikes, Student Activism, UAW, University of California, Worker Rights

On May 15, United Auto Workers Local 4811, which represents 48,000 student workers across the University of California campuses, voted to authorize a strike following police and administrative repression of pro-Palestine students staging Gaza Solidarity Encampments. Strike authorization votes took place from May 13 to May 15. Workers voted in favor of striking by a landslide of 79%. There is currently no fixed date for a strike, but the vote empowers the union’s executive board to call a strike at any time. Were Local 4811 to strike, it would be the first strike in history to be called for Palestinian liberation.

University Of California Office Of The President Attacked

May 14, 2024 Sacred Black and Red, IndyBay. Resist! Campus Movement, Direct Action, Gaza, Genocide, Solidarity, Student Activism, University of California

With the Aurora Borealis above us and the martyrs in our hearts, we attacked the UC Office of the President in solidarity with the Palestinian Resistance. Using a fire extinguisher filled with red paint we covered the facade and smashed seven windows. Then, with access to the building, we released 500 cockroaches inside and emptied a second fire extinguisher onto the interior. We finalized the act by leaving a water jug inscribed with "Bonk" at the scene - an homage to the militants of Cal Poly Humboldt and the international student encampment movement.

University Of California Is Escalating Its Crackdown On Dissent

July 5, 2023 Rafael Jaime, In These Times. Resist! California, Higher Education, Police, Repression, University of California

Just before the Fourth of July weekend, postdoctoral scholar Jessica Ng, graduate student William Schneider, and another graduate student at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), were arrested by campus police on charges of felony vandalism over $400 and conspiracy to commit a crime. They were arrested at their homes (where their personal items were confiscated including keys, phones and at least one computer), taken to San Diego county jails, and held overnight on $20,000 bail each. Their crime? Allegedly writing slogans like “Living Wage Now” on a concrete campus building — in washable markers and chalk — during a peaceful protest almost a month earlier.

What Message Does A ‘Vote No’ Campaign Send?

January 7, 2023 Helena Worthen and Joe Berry, Labor Notes. Strategize! California, Education, Labor Movement, Unions, University of California, Worker Rights and Jobs

In December, the contract bargaining team for Auto Workers (UAW) Local 2865 brought back a tentative agreement with the University of California and presented it to its membership of teaching assistants, graders and tutors for ratification. A lively “vote no” campaign arose. A vote no campaign sends a very public message. Does it tell the boss that the union is divided, and therefore weak, or does it warn the boss that members are ready to fight for more? What does it say about the union and the union leadership? When members vote on ratification of a contract, the main issue is trust—whether in the contents of the deal, the process, or both.

UC Graduate Students’ Bargaining Committee Drops Core Demands

December 17, 2022 Indigo Olivier, In These Times. Resist! California, Education, Strikes, University of California, Worker Rights and Jobs

Academic workers at the University of California (UC), who are entering their second month on the picket line, are internally weighing strategic questions about how their union should move forward with negotiations. Roughly 36,000 graduate teaching and research workers, represented by two different United Auto Workers (UAW) locals, remain on strike after a third UAW local representing 11,000 UC postdocs signed a five-year contract with the university and returned to work December 9. UAW Local 2865 is the largest of the UC unions on strike. It represents some of the university’s lowest-paid workers—about 19,000 teaching assistants, tutors and readers, some of whom make an estimated $24,000 a year.

A Communiqué From The Liberated Dining Halls Of So-Called Santa Cruz

December 11, 2022 IGD Worldwide, It's Going Down. Resist! California, Education, Labor Movement, Strikes, Unions, University of California, Worker Rights and Jobs

Santa Cruz, California - The colonial capitalist university will never win. Union sell-outs and scabs will never win. Here at so-called Santa Cruz, we declare and express our solidarity to all communities in struggle. Today, along with comrades across so-called California, we are engaging in a transterritorial attack on UC incorporated and what they call food insecurity, a condition created by their capitalist greed. These spaces, like the dining commons, are spaces we understand as battlegrounds of the ongoing war against subsistence, where proles take up the war against capital by expropriating dining halls and feeding one another.

How Academic Workers’ Leverage Can Grow In A Long-Haul Strike

December 10, 2022 Jonathan Mackris and Abrar Abidi, Labor Notes. Strategize! California, Education, Labor Movement, University of California, Worker Rights and Jobs

California - Forty-eight thousand academic workers have been on strike across the 10 campuses of the University of California since November 14. It’s the biggest strike in the country this year. The strikers are in four bargaining units—teaching assistants, student researchers, postdoctoral scholars, and academic researchers—all affiliated with the United Auto Workers. The following speeches were written for and read out at the Strike to Win Assembly on December 6 at UC Berkeley. This assembly was put together by rank-and-file members from the humanities, social sciences, and science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) in UAW Local 2865 and Student Researchers United (SRU-UAW) in order to develop strategies for a building a longer, sustainable strike across campus.

We Need To Transform What It Means to Be An Academic Worker

December 7, 2022 Janine Jackson, Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting. Resist! California, Education, Strikes, University of California, Worker Rights and Jobs

When it comes to corporate news media coverage of labor actions, there are unfortunately a few tropes to look out for, even in 2022. First, while strikes in other countries may be presented as signs of freedom, in the US they will often be presented in terms of the disruption they cause. The New York Times’ November 14 report on the strike by some 48,000 University of California teaching assistants, researchers and others gave skimming readers the shorthand “highlight” that these people “walked off the job Monday, forcing some classes to be canceled.” “Classes were disrupted, research slowed and office hours canceled,” the paper noted, “only a few weeks away from final examinations.” Whatever an article goes on to say, the “harmful disruption” presentation encourages readers to understand that the status quo before the action was not harmful and did not disrupt, and that worker actions are therefore willful, selfish and possibly malignant.

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