graduate student unionization research

A message on graduate student unionization

Dear members of the Stanford community,

On April 3, the Stanford Graduate Workers Union (SGWU) publicly launched a unionization campaign. As many of you may know, these organizing efforts follow a 2016 decision by the National Labor Relations Board that gave graduate students working as teaching or research assistants at private universities the right to unionize.

We recognize and greatly value the many contributions that graduate students make to Stanford’s mission of teaching and research. Stanford’s relationship with our graduate students is, first and foremost, an educational one. Stanford believes that the instructional and research activities in which PhD students engage are primarily in service of their training for the careers they will pursue after they obtain their degree, whether in academia or elsewhere. Our vibrant graduate student community across Stanford’s seven schools is also a diverse one, with distinct individual voices and perspectives. As graduate students consider their path forward, we wish to summarize the principles that will inform the university’s approach.

First, the decision to unionize is a consequential one, both for current and for future graduate students. During this process, graduate students’ most important role will be to educate themselves about unionization and to exercise their right to vote. Stanford commits to providing factual information to our community through this website.

We encourage every graduate student to consider closely what it means to become a member of a union, what it means to engage in collective bargaining, and what it means to have their educational experience governed by a collective bargaining agreement. It is important to note that, if elected, the union will represent not only today’s graduate students, but future graduate students, who will not have the same opportunity to vote on union representation.

Second, this is a complex topic, on which reasonable people can disagree. As leaders of a learning community, we invite and encourage graduate students and others to engage in robust discussion of these issues. At the same time, it’s critical that individuals do not attempt to unduly influence students’ choices or their votes. Graduate students must be free to make this decision on their own.

Third, unionization is about employment matters, not academic ones. Should graduate students vote to be represented by the SGWU, it is our strong position that academic matters, including admissions decisions, curriculum and degree requirements, organization of programs, academic standards, evaluation of academic progress, and assignment of research and teaching assistant roles, are rights that should be retained by the university.

As graduate students make this consequential decision, we are committed to an ongoing, open dialogue with them within the parameters that the law in this area allows. Just as we are dedicated to deepening their expertise, nurturing their creativity, and ultimately preparing them for future success, we will continue to work hard to understand, appreciate, and be responsive to the needs of our graduate students, so that we may also foster their well-being throughout their time at Stanford.

Marc Tessier-Lavigne President

Persis Drell Provost

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Graduate student unions in the United States

• Published: March 2006
• Volume 27 , pages 55–73, ( 2006 )

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• Parbudyal Singh 1 ,
• Deborah M. Zinni 2 &
• Anne F. MacLennan 3  

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Graduate student unions have been attracting considerable academic and practitioner attention recently, especially since the New York University decision in 2000. Given the declining fortunes of the union movement, it seems as if the academic sector has the potential of becoming a vital new organizing frontier. However, there is scant research on this issue. We trace the origins and evolution of graduate student unions in the United States, discuss the relevant statutory and case law, analyze pertinent collective bargaining and strike issues, and suggest avenues for future research.

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Singh, P., Zinni, D.M. & MacLennan, A.F. Graduate student unions in the United States. J Labor Res 27 , 55–73 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12122-006-1009-9

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FAQs about Graduate Student Unionization

Updated September 7, 2022

On April 6, 2022, Chancellor Melissa Nobles and Vice Chancellor Ian Waitz announced the results of the April 4-5 graduate student unionization election ; congratulated current and past MIT GSU-UE members on their four years of dedicated work that culminated in the union’s victory; and committed to bargain in good-faith with the union over the terms and conditions of employment for bargaining unit members.

The following frequently asked questions provide answers to questions the community may have in light of the new graduate student union. Community members with questions about unions and unionization that are not addressed below may contact [email protected] .

BACKGROUND / MEMBERSHIP

Q: What does it mean that MIT now has a graduate student union?

A: MIT is required to recognize the union as the exclusive bargaining representative of all graduate students in the certified unit. This means, among other things, that the Institute would not be able to work with any other body or organization, including the MIT Graduate Student Council, on matters affecting wages, hours, and working conditions for those in the certified unit, nor could MIT negotiate directly with any individual member of the unit on any matter affecting wages, hours, and working conditions, unless otherwise authorized by the contract.

MIT and the union will also have to meet their obligation to negotiate in good faith for that initial collective bargaining agreement. First contracts can take a very long time to finalize: A June 2021 Bloomberg Law analysis estimated that, on average, it takes 409 days for new unions and their employers to sign their first collective bargaining agreement; in all cases involving student unions at private universities, more than a year elapsed between a successful unionization vote and arrival at a ratified initial contract. At Harvard University, this process took almost two years, and at Columbia University, there is still no contract four years after the union’s certification.

Q: Who is included in the bargaining unit?

The bargaining unit certified by the NLRB is:

Graduate students enrolled in Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) degree programs who are employed to provide instructional or research services, including research assistants, teaching assistants, and instructor G’s, but excluding undergraduate students; graduate student resident advisors; graduate fellows who are not also employed as either research assistants or teaching assistants; hourly graders who are not also employed as either research assistants or teaching assistants; graduate students not seeking MIT degrees, including visiting students; office clericals, managers, guards, and supervisors as defined in the Act.

However, certain research assistants in the Linguistics and Political Science departments; hourly employees who are not graders and who may provide instructional or research services; and graduate students conducting research at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute (WHOI) who are either supervised or paid by MIT (but not both), are neither included in or excluded from the bargaining unit covered by this certification, inasmuch as the parties did not agree on the inclusion or exclusion of these classifications but agreed to vote them subject to challenge and resolution of their inclusion or exclusion was unnecessary because their ballots were not determinative of the election results.

Q: Will MIT share graduate students’ email addresses or other contact information with the union?

MIT is required to provide information about graduate students to the NLRB in response to any petition for representation that may be filed. When this occurs, the union would have access to the same information MIT provides to the NLRB. This information could include addresses, job classifications, phone numbers, and personal email addresses. MIT would have to disclose such information to the NLRB and to the union in the event of a scheduled NLRB election.

Note: MIT respects the privacy of our graduate students and generally does not disclose personal information about them to third parties except with their consent, or to MIT-sanctioned organizations and MIT personnel on a need-to-know basis. Further, many of our graduate students may also be considered employees under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), and MIT does not provide personal information about employees to organizing unions outside the formal National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) process.

COLLECTIVE BARGAINING / NEGOTIATION 

Q: Where can I learn more about the progress of  the Collective Bargaining agreement? 

We will keep the MIT community updated on progress. You can also find relevant news and resources by visiting this website .

Q: Could MIT make exceptions to provisions in a collective bargaining agreement to accommodate the needs of individual graduate students?

A: As a general rule, no. MIT would be bound by the provisions of the collective bargaining agreement. Unless such exceptions are provided for in the contract or otherwise agreed to by the union, they are not permitted.

For example, if a contract set parameters on the work hours for a research assistant, an individual graduate student would not be able to make personal arrangements with their advisor or PI to work outside those parameters, unless the contract provided for exceptions or unless the union agreed to such arrangements.

Q: In collective bargaining negotiations, can MIT propose its own provisions or changes from the status quo?

A: Yes. Both MIT and the union representatives are free to propose any items or provisions for the contract, including changes from the status quo involving wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment.

Employers and unions are required by federal law to bargain collectively over “wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment.” Other issues of importance to many students — such as local housing costs and participation in Institute decision-making — are outside the scope of what is required to be negotiated.

Q: What is the process for changing affiliations after a union has been established?

A: Once a union is certified by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), the union may not be removed unless decertified by the NLRB . Similar to the certification process, employees seeking to remove or replace the existing union with a different union must get at least 30 percent of their coworkers to sign cards in order to file a petition asking the NLRB to conduct an election.

GENERAL INFORMATION ON UNIONS AND THE UNIONIZATION PROCESS

Q: What is the NLRB?

A: The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is a federal agency created to enforce the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), a federal law to protect the rights of employees and employers. The law protects the rights of employees to choose or reject union representation.

Q: What is a union?

A: A union, or labor organization, is any organization or association of any kind in which employees participate and which exists for the purpose, in whole or in part, of dealing with employers on wages, benefits, hours, grievances or other terms or conditions of employment. A union that represents a majority of employees in an “appropriate bargaining unit,” and that has been certified by the NLRB following an election or voluntarily recognized by an employer, serves as the representative of that bargaining unit on all such matters involving wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment. An appropriate bargaining unit is a group of employees who share a clear and identifiable community of interest sufficient to be represented by a union.

A union that has been certified by the NLRB, or that has been voluntarily recognized by an employer, negotiates a contract (also known as a collective bargaining agreement) on behalf of the bargaining unit to establish the terms and conditions of employment, including such things as wages, hours of work, benefits, and other working conditions. A union also represents its members when disputes arise over the terms of the contract.

Q: What are union dues?

A: Dues are the cost of membership in a union. They are used to cover the costs of negotiating a contract, contract administration and resolutions of grievances (claims of breach of contract). In addition, unions also use dues for the purpose of organizing employees at other employers, and to make political contributions.

Q: What is the election process to form a union?

A: The election process is conducted and supervised by representatives of the NLRB. An election is typically held within approximately three or four weeks after the filing of a representation petition by the union, but the timing may differ depending upon how the NLRB treats outstanding bargaining unit issues, and how long it takes to resolve those issues. Once an election date is set, secret ballot voting would likely take place in a central location at a designated date and time, or by a mail-in process, as determined by the NLRB.

The election outcome is determined by a simple majority of those who actually vote, not by a majority of all eligible voters. Union representation will be determined by voters, and will be binding on both voters and non-voters in the proposed bargaining unit. Therefore, it is important that all members of a proposed bargaining unit vote, even if they are not interested in unionization.

Those who have already signed membership or authorization cards are not obligated to vote in favor of the union during the secret ballot election: They are free to change their mind. Once a petition is filed with the NLRB, and the showing of interest is confirmed, membership or authorization cards usually serve no further purpose.

Q: What does the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) say regarding negotiations?

A: Section 8(d) of the NLRA states:

For the purposes of this section, to bargain collectively is the performance of the mutual obligation of the employer and the representative of the employees to meet at reasonable times and confer in good faith with respect to wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment, or the negotiation of an agreement, or any question arising thereunder, and the execution of a written contract incorporating any agreement reached if requested by either party, but such obligation does not compel either party to agree to a proposal or require the making of a concession.

Q: Is anything required to be in a collective bargaining agreement?

A: No, the NLRA does not require that any particular right or provision be part of a contract. Collective bargaining agreements normally have provisions on compensation and benefits, workload and assignments, hours of work, grievance procedures and a variety of other provisions, but no particular provisions are mandated by law. You may find some contracts have a particular provision but another contract might not — it all depends on what those parties have chosen to include in their agreements. The law requires good-faith negotiations over mandatory subjects of bargaining. However, the law specifically does not require either party to make a particular concession or to agree to a particular proposal during negotiations.

Q: What might be covered in a union contract?

A: The NLRA requires employers and unions to bargain collectively over “wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment.” These are called mandatory subjects of bargaining, over which the parties must negotiate.

Other topics of interest that do not fall under the umbrella of mandatory negotiations might be addressed by the parties as “permissive” subjects — topics over which neither side is required to negotiate. Items such as the hiring process and housing costs would fall into that category. The NLRB has not yet addressed with any specificity what “terms and conditions of employment” are in the graduate student context. In a case involving Columbia University graduate students, the NLRB stated that academic decisions remain the prerogative of the university, but what constitutes an academic versus a non-academic decision is not yet clear.

There may be many issues of importance to our students that would not be considered mandatory subjects of bargaining under the law, such as concerns about student housing.

Some guidance about the terms and conditions that may be addressed in a contract can be gleaned from examining other graduate student contracts. For example, the contract between Harvard University and its graduate student teaching and research assistants represented by the United Auto Workers (UAW) covers numerous terms and conditions of employment such as salaries, benefits, working hours, and grievance procedures; nondiscrimination provisions; leaves of absence; job postings; and access to offices.

However, many rights are retained by Harvard. In the Harvard contract with the UAW, the university retains the exclusive right to determine and control the university’s mission, objectives, priorities, operations, and resources, among many other rights. Harvard also retains the right to control “all matters of academic judgment and decision-making, including ‘who is taught, what is taught, how it is taught and who does the teaching.’” All matters affecting research methodology and materials, and external grants including application, selection, funding, administration, usage, accountability, and termination are also retained by Harvard.

Also, there are great variations in union contracts because it is up to the parties to those contracts to decide what they will agree to and what they will not. The appearance of a clause in one contract — no matter what it is — does not guarantee that it will appear in an MIT contract if the union were to be elected.

Q: How many graduate student union contracts are there around the country?

A: There are about 42 graduate student contracts, according to the National Center for the Study of Collective Bargaining in Higher Education and the Professions. The majority are at public universities; there are only nine graduate student union contracts in the private sector, at American University, Brandeis University, Brown University, Columbia University, Georgetown University, Harvard University, The New School, New York University, and Tufts University.

Q: Are state labor laws different from the NLRA?

A: Yes. In many cases, state and federal laws differ significantly when it comes to issues such as bargaining topics, negotiation impasse procedures, the right to strike, and required union membership. For example, strikes are prohibited under most state laws, making strikes rare at public universities, but strikes are legal in the private sector.

Many state laws also, for example, specify what issues are considered “terms and conditions of employment,” and therefore subject to collective bargaining, and what issues are “academic,” and therefore not subject to collective bargaining. Federal law is not tailored to address the issues of academic and educational matters related to graduate student activities.

Q: How long do student union contract negotiations typically take? Have students represented by unions at other universities gone on strike?

A: A June 2021 Bloomberg Law analysis estimated that, on average, it takes 409 days for new unions and their employers to sign their first collective bargaining agreement (CBA). * Negotiations began in October 2018 and ended in June 2020, and included a 29-day strike in December 2019. The parties initially agreed only to a one-year contract, which expired on June 30, 2021. The parties agreed to a second contract, which was ratified in November 2021, with 70.6 percent of voters in support of the new deal, and after a three-day strike and the threat of a second strike.

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Stanford’s Negotiations with United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers of America Local 1043, Stanford Graduate Workers Union

Stanford University and United Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers of America Local 1043, Stanford Graduate Workers Union (UE Local 1043-SGWU) began contract negotiations in November 2023.

We recognize and greatly value the many contributions that graduate students make to Stanford’s mission of teaching and research, and will continue to make every effort to understand, appreciate, and be responsive to their needs. Students are at the heart of Stanford’s mission, and we remain dedicated to their well-being and growth. This commitment will guide us throughout negotiations and beyond.

UE Local 1043-SGWU represents most Ph.D., Master’s, and J.D. students enrolled at Stanford University who provide instructional and/or research services for the university. For a complete definition of UE Local 1043-SGWU, please see the Union FAQs . 

We will continue to provide updates during negotiations. 

Negotiation Guiding Principles 

• Ensuring that the university can continue to provide the highest quality educational experience for its graduate students
• Preserving the faculty-student relationship
• Safeguarding the integrity of the university’s teaching and research mission
• Maintaining the university’s academic prerogatives, including admission decisions, curriculum and degree requirements, organization of programs, evaluation of academic progress, and assignment of research and teaching assistant roles
• Fulfilling our responsibility to serve the entire university community, understanding implications of negotiated agreements on faculty, staff and other students
• Ensuring fiscal responsibility
• Ensuring the university remains a leader in higher education, including by continuing to attract the best graduate students

Graduate Student Unionization

Home / Overview

Beginning in September 2022 and over the course of 12 months, the MIT bargaining team negotiated with the GSU. The teams met more than 20 times to reach a first contract.

MIT’s principles guiding the negotiations included:

• Fulfilling our responsibility to serve the entire community, understanding implications on overall enterprise, including all graduate students and undergraduate students
• Ensuring students have flexibility to make their own choices — avoiding unnecessary mandates, including union membership
• Refraining from bargaining on academic matters
• Protecting the effectiveness of the research and discovery enterprise
• Protecting the unique nature of teacher-learner relationship
• Ensuring the Institute remains competitive and continues to attract top talent
• Ensuring equity with respect to our other employees
• Ensuring fiscal responsibility for this generation at MIT and future generations

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3 Questions: Implementing the MIT Graduate Student Union’s collective bargaining agreement

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When eligible MIT graduate students voted to be represented by a union in April 2022, the decision set in motion significant changes in the graduate student ecosystem at the Institute. Moving forward, graduate students in the Graduate Student Union (GSU)’s bargaining unit — about 3,500 research assistants, teaching assistants, and instructors-G — will be represented by the GSU and covered by the terms of a collective bargaining agreement (CBA). MIT negotiated with the GSU throughout the 2022-23 academic year, ultimately reaching a CBA that was ratified by a union vote on Sept. 23, 2023. Vice Chancellor for Undergraduate and Graduate Education Ian A. Waitz, who helped lead the negotiation process, explains the nuts and bolts of the CBA, how it will be implemented, and other graduate student support measures that are underway.

Q: What are the highlights of the CBA reached between MIT and the Graduate Student Union?

A: First of all, it’s important to note that the CBA covers the terms and conditions of employment for anyone in the bargaining unit — all grad student RAs, TAs, and instructor-Gs (which are graduate students with considerable teaching experience) — whether or not they have elected to join the union and become union members. There are a number of economic provisions and benefits in the agreement, including salary increases of 5.4 percent, 3.5 percent, and 3.25 percent over the three years of the contract; an 83.3 percent subsidy of the individual dental care premium and an increased MBTA subsidy; and grants to defray expenses that certain groups of graduate students have, such as international students and students with families. The Office of Graduate Education (OGE) created a grad student benefits table that spells out further details.

We also reached agreement on non-economic provisions, such as the grievance and arbitration process and a no-strike clause. Finally, we agreed that the GSU would be an “agency shop,” which means that all RAs, TAs, and instructor-Gs are required to pay 1.44 percent of their RA, TA, or instructor-G wages to the union as a condition of their employment, whether or not they choose to be a member of the union. I provided more information about this contractual provision in an email I sent to all graduate students .

Again, these are just a few highlights. There are many other issues we agreed upon during the yearlong negotiation process, so I would encourage anyone who is interested to take a look at the Collective Bargaining Agreement [Touchstone authentication required]. As for students who are not in the bargaining unit, such as those on fellowships, we are committed to ensuring a level of equity regarding stipends and various benefits, and we want to make sure they understand all the ways they are supported. The benefits table has more information about benefits available to students on certain fellowships.

Q: What does implementation of the CBA entail, and how is it progressing?

A: Well, not surprisingly, implementation is complex. The CBA represents about 60 pages of contractual commitments that came into effect all at once. Some changes that we are making may seem relatively straightforward, like issuing bargaining unit members retroactive 5.4 percent salary increases. But even that involved 5,000 different appointments, many with unique characteristics. And for the sake of equity, MIT also raised the stipends of most students who are on fellowships, and therefore are not part of the bargaining unit, by 0.15 percent, to bring their AY [academic year]-23-24 stipend increase to 5.4 percent as well. There are several other new benefits — MBTA passes, the new dental insurance subsidy, parking — that also require new policies, procedures, and systems.

Other issues we need to address are organizationally complicated in that they involve all supervisors and administrators of graduate student employees, as well as the graduate student employees themselves. One example is how we manage graduate student appointments. Before the CBA was ratified, our system was very simple: Faculty and staff who supervise graduate students would notify their departments about the appointment and funding source. Now we need to process appointments sooner, and faculty and staff supervisors need to provide many more details about the appointment, such as hours students are required to work and the duties they are expected to perform.

Moreover, we need to efficiently document changes in a student’s appointment status, because their status may impact whether or not they are in the bargaining unit. For example, a student might be on an RA one semester, and then the next semester they might be on a fellowship, and are therefore not in the bargaining unit. This all needs to be tracked carefully and in a timely way.

Yet another change is that we are now required to formally review and act on a dozen different kinds of leaves. And students in the bargaining unit are required to formally submit requests for most types of leave. Some of these are handled centrally, some (like vacation) are handled by the individual graduate employee supervisor. Students on fellowships will continue to arrange for flexibility/time away from their academic requirements as they always have, by working with their advisor or with their department and GradSupport as appropriate for longer times away.

We will also have new requirements for formal review and approval of outside professional activities that graduate student workers may wish to pursue.

In order to address many of these new procedures, IS&T [Information Systems and Technology] and the broader MIT CBA implementation team have launched a new system comprising a student appointment portal, a supervisor portal, and an administrator portal.

In addition, those of us who supervise or work with graduate students will need to be clearer about our expectations for academic work. We’ve received a lot of questions from faculty about how the 20-hour workload for graduate students in the bargaining unit relates to academic requirements, like completing a thesis. To iron all of these issues out, the Committee on Graduate Programs (CGP) and OGE are developing policies for departments so that they can communicate their expectations. CGP and OGE will also be issuing guidance on the creation of a new graduate academic performance group, made up of students, staff, administrators, and faculty, to look at cases related to academic performance.

Needless to say, making these kinds of changes is a challenge for a decentralized institution like ours! But we are embracing it, because ultimately it will benefit all of our students and programs.  

Q: Besides the CBA, what other priorities is MIT working on to support graduate students?

A: One of the priorities that we have been focusing on for the past few years is graduate student professional development. The Graduate Student Professional Development Refinement and Implementation Committee , which was an outgrowth of Task Force 2021 and Beyond , has been meeting for over a year now and is working to design a professional development requirement for MIT PhDs. The committee, which is made up of faculty, administrators, and PhD students, has visited a number of departments, student groups, and co-curricular offices to ask for input and spark conversation about professional development at the graduate level. Some of the ideas they are currently exploring are ways in which PhD students might benefit from forming a committee of professional development mentors, and also how internships might be made available as a professional development activity to interested PhDs. 

In addition, Career Advising & Professional Development, in collaboration with partners, is just now unrolling two new professional development certificate programs on research mentoring and grant writing training. The Research Mentoring Training Certificate is a collaboration with the Engineering Communication Labs, and 245 PhDs and postdocs applied for this program. The Grant Writing Training Certificate Program, which is a collaboration with the Office of the Vice President for Research, was also received well, seeing 325 applications for the 100 available places. It’s exciting to see this ongoing improvement in MIT’s professional development programming taking shape.

Ultimately, our goal to enhance the life and learning experience for graduate students has remained a north star. MIT has been and remains one of the best places in the world to pursue an advanced degree in everything from philosophy to urban studies to mechanical engineering. While unionization is changing how we manage our graduate teaching and research enterprise in some fundamental ways, we are embracing it with a spirit of opportunity. We are particularly grateful for all of our campus partners, especially our graduate administrators, instructors and faculty, and other staff, who are working with us to adapt and respond to all that we need to do with such grace.

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As grad student unionizing effort grows, universities raise stipends, benefits.

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The University of Pennsylvania has recently announced it will make its largest ever increase in ... [+] stipends for its Ph.D. students.

Just one month after 48,000 academic employees at the University of California’s (UC) ten campuses walked off their jobs in the nation’s largest higher education strike ever , the ramifications are beginning to be felt at other institutions.

The national fallout from the UC strike is now a ripple. It soon may become a wave. Graduate students are intensifying their unionization efforts and making new demands for better compensation at other universities across the nation. For their part, several institutions have recently announced they will boost stipends for their graduate assistants, perhaps in hopes of preventing picket lines and work slowdowns on their own campuses.

At UC, the strike has entered its fifth week for some academic workers. While about 12,000 postdoctoral employees and academic researchers reached an agreement with the university last week for higher salaries and additional benefits and are returning to work, 36,000 graduate assistants remained on strike, demanding significant pay increases, bigger child-care subsidies and other benefits.

The University of California and the United Auto Workers, which represents the graduate assistants, have entered into private mediation , which now appears to have yielded a tentative agreement .

The UC strike, along with a recent walkout by adjunct faculty at the New School in New York City, suggests the possible start of a new era of union activism on American campuses.

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Earlier this year, graduate student workers at Indiana Universit y in Bloomington went on strike to demand the university recognize them as a union. Although the school refused to do so, it did meet many of the other major demands made by the students.

This week, graduate assistants at the University of Texas staged a day-long “grade-in,” a rally intended to bring attention to their complaints about low pay and poor working conditions. Texas law prohibits state employees, including university employees, from collective bargaining or organizing a work stoppage. The students used the “grade-in” as an alternative way of protesting their compensation.

According to reporting in the Austin American -Statesman , “Students and other supporters chanted and rallied outside the UT Tower, calling for higher pay while holding signs that read “Pay grad workers a living wage” and “Academia isn’t a calling. It’s a job,” among others. After the brief rally Tuesday morning they sat in the lobby of UT’s Life Science Library and worked and graded papers until 5 p.m.”

At Yale University , graduate students are currently conducting an election to form a union. “It's a really exciting moment, not only for our campaign but also in the history of grad organizing at Yale," said Abigail Field s, a a graduate educator in the French department and union organizer. "There's been a wave of graduate worker unionization over the past few years. Grad workers at our peer institutions, Harvard and Colombia won contracts last year."

Earlier this month, Boston University graduate students voted overwhelmingly to unionize , joining Service Employees International Union Local 509. According to the union, the vote was 1,414 to 28 in favor.

Florida State University graduate assistants recently rallied to dramatize their complaints over poor pay, the rights of international students, high healthcare premiums and required student fees among graduate workers.

Unionizing activities are also underway at the University of Chicago and Johns Hopkins University.

Recognizing the still small, but growing, unionization movement and the fact that grad students are being hit hard by inflated housing and food costs, several research universities have decided to make significant increases to their graduate student stipends.

The University of Pennsylvania recently announced that it will raise its minimum Ph.D. stipend to $38,000 , beginning in the 2023-24 academic year. The increase will be the largest one-time increment to graduate stipends in Penn’s history.

“Our doctoral students are at the heart of our mission of research and education across a wide range of academic areas,” said Interim Provost Beth A. Winkelstein. “This one-time increase recognizes the unique pressures they currently face, especially in the wake of delays to research and hiring that many experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic. It will also help to ensure that Penn remains competitive in recruiting exceptional scholars in our Graduate Groups.”

Duke University gave all its active Ph.D. students a $1,000 one-time payment in October of this year. In addition, it’s increasing its full-year Ph.D. stipend for the 2023-2024 academic to $38,600, an 11.4% bump over the current $34,660.

Other universities recently announcing substantial increases to their graduate student stipends include the University of North Carolina , Rice University and the University of Buffalo .

With universities offering better compensation either as concession or a preemptive strategy to address graduate student demands, momentum for the unionization of academic workers is almost sure to pick up steam. While the full implications of the University of California strike are still unfolding, we may be seeing the beginning of a new period of campus activism with labor organizing as a prominent feature.

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Graduate Student Unionization: For World-Class Research and Teaching at UChicago

For graduate workers, organizing their colleagues and fighting for union recognition are imperative steps in producing high-quality work.

By University of Chicago Graduate Students United - United Electrical December 7, 2022

On November 16, members of UChicago Graduate Students United – United Electrical Workers (GSU-UE) delivered a letter to the offices of President Alivisatos, Provost Lee, and Secretary of the University Lori Berko. This letter was a request for the University administration to voluntarily recognize our labor union. After the University declined to voluntarily recognize us, we delivered a petition for a union election to the National Labor Relations Board and the University on November 30. Following the University’s public response to our union effort on November 29, we are continuing to engage in public dialogue about our campaign. At this juncture in our organizing, we want to pause and contextualize our efforts, to highlight our reasons for unionizing and our aspirations for the UChicago community.

Over the last few months, we have conducted surveys, convened mass meetings, and engaged in hundreds of one-on-one conversations in labs and offices across campus. We have become increasingly aware of a number of challenges faced by graduate student workers on this campus that prevent us from achieving the highest standards for academic research and instruction, including but not limited to: annual salaries below the living wage in Cook County, expensive dental and vision insurance, insufficient grievance and time off policies, and a lack of resources for graduate workers who are parenting, disabled, or international students.

To excel as a world-class institution, the University of Chicago must invest in making graduate programs accessible to graduate students from a variety of backgrounds and experiences, especially our colleagues of color, our international colleagues, our first-generation colleagues, our disabled colleagues, and our caregiving/parenting colleagues. This is why GSU-UE is fighting for common-sense improvements to our working conditions as researchers and instructors. We are fighting for:

• A living wage that keeps up with cost of living.
• Guaranteed dental, vision, and comprehensive benefits.
• Equitable policies for our labs, classrooms, and community.
• Fairness and support for international students.
• Transparency and decision-making power.

In our capacity as researchers and instructors, we work alongside faculty and adjuncts year-round, teaching students, grading assignments, running experiments, collecting and analyzing data, assembling manuscripts, and otherwise ensuring that UChicago is a world-class institution for research and learning. Through countless conversations with our coworkers, it is clear that UChicago does not provide us with sufficient resources to efficiently produce the best research possible. As employees of the University of Chicago—and as experts in what we need to produce high-quality work—we are seeking a seat at the table when it comes to our working conditions, pay, and protections.

As a labor organization that formed in 2007, we’ve been around for long enough to know that the University prefers to see us as students, not workers. Despite the University’s assertions about our student status, we are acutely aware that if we do not fulfill labor obligations related to teaching and research, we are unable to retain our pay, our benefits, or our statuses as students. As individuals tasked with running data analysis, teaching undergraduate and master’s level courses, and working to support the research of our faculty supervisors, we are indeed workers, and we are motivated to organize in solidarity with each other.

Furthermore, unions for graduate students are a fundamentally normal feature in U.S. universities. Graduate employees at many public universities have benefited from strong unions since the 1960s (for example, at the University of Illinois Chicago , University of Michigan , and University of Wisconsin–Madison ). We look forward to joining our unionized peers in private universities at New York University ( NYU ) , Columbia , Harvard , the New School , Brown , and Georgetown , all of whom have bargained contracts with their administrations, along with the many others who are building campaigns right now, such as our fellow UE-affiliated graduate unions at MIT , Indiana University , Northwestern , Dartmouth , and Johns Hopkins .

GSU-UE currently represents a majority of graduate students who perform work across the university. Over 2,000 graduate workers in every division of the university have signed union cards, indicating their desire for representation in bargaining a labor contract with the university. (For context, the University census indicates there are 3,135 Ph.D. students enrolled. We also estimate several hundred masters students perform work as TAs or RAs.) As a fundamentally democratic body, we aim to set bargaining goals for a contract that will meet the needs of every department and every graduate student. A union provides the substantive, democratic decision-making power that graduate students currently lack in our workplaces.

We know that unions deliver tangible, meaningful wins for graduate students. Student Workers of Columbia recently won a 40% increase of the minimum hourly wage, guaranteed 3% annual raises for the duration of the contract, 75% coverage for dental premiums, $5,000 child care stipends, an out-of-pocket medical expenses fund of $350,000 that increases over time, two weeks guaranteed sick leave, and access to neutral arbitration for cases of harassment and discrimination. University of Michigan graduate students have negotiated better conditions for international students, including reimbursement of Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVIS) fees, covering the cost of an English Language Proficiency workshop, overwork protections to prevent violating the terms of the student visa, and the creation of a legal hotline for international students to call with visa and immigration issues. The Harvard Graduate Student Union recently won dedicated funds for childcare, dental, and out-of-pocket medical expenses, twelve weeks of unpaid family and medical leave where access to healthcare and benefits is retained, guaranteed desk space and private advising space, prepayment for work-related travel, and discounted transit passes. In 2021, student workers at NYU ratified a contract that prevented U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection from entering campus and the university from giving either agency information about NYU community members’ immigration statuses as well as designating the presence of the New York City Police Department on campus as a health and safety concern that the union can bargain over. While these represent just a few, incomplete examples of the many real improvements that unions bring about for graduate students, they reveal the importance of using workers’ power to improve broader campus conditions.

As an organization with a long history of collective organizing at UChicago, our unified demands of the university administration have played substantive roles in a number of material improvements for graduate workers in recent years. After our 2018 walkout , the University overhauled its funding structure to ensure that Ph.D. students are funded for the duration of our programs, rather than abruptly cutting funds before completion. After our student services fee refusal campaign in 2021, the University agreed to cover the fee for Ph.D. students in all divisions. Graduate workers no longer have to take $1,200–$1,600 out of their stipends each year to pay the university for unnamed services. We proudly claim these organizing victories as examples of what we can accomplish as a union, and we feel confident that with legal recognition, our voice will only get stronger.

Graduate workers at the University of Chicago spend countless hours working for the benefit of everyone at the university. We teach, research, and support our faculty and undergraduates because we believe in the importance of a strong intellectual community. As individuals invested in the robust intellectual legacy of our university, we see graduate unionization as the logical extension of that powerful tradition–in supporting graduate workers’ free speech and protecting our labor, we will only grow in our capacity to produce world-class research and instruction here. We look forward to winning the election and sitting down at the bargaining table with the University.

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Graduate Student Union Contract Implementation Update (Graduate Student Message)

Dear graduate students,

We write today to update you on the implementation of the newly ratified graduate student union contract. Because we have received many questions about bargaining unit status and benefits eligibility, we are sending this message directly to PhD, MFA, DMA and MM students to address those timely questions.

Starting in September 2024, Northwestern will extend certain benefits at its discretion to students who are outside the collective bargaining agreement-required populations. For example, fully funded (those who receive a stipend and full tuition grant) PhD, MFA and DMA students in their period of funding all will receive the increased stipend and have access to health, vision and dental benefits regardless of bargaining unit status.

A new set of charts on the University’s Union Contract webpage illustrates how key benefits must be applied per the collective bargaining agreement (CBA) and when Northwestern will use its discretion to extend them to additional students. A new union contract definitions guide on that page is designed to clarify the application of benefits and terminologies that are becoming increasingly common in the current labor environment.

For contract terms that apply before September 1, 2024, such as the ratification bonus and the June 1 stipend increase, the University is carefully evaluating who is in the bargaining unit and who is not in order to award these benefits accurately per CBA requirements.

It is important to note that not all graduate students are included in the bargaining unit all the time. You will alternate between being in and out based on whether you are providing instructional or research services for the University in any given quarter. For example, different graduate students may have been in the bargaining unit in Winter Quarter 2024 (at the time of ratification) than are in Spring Quarter 2024, so different contract terms will apply as follows:

Only in the Bargaining Unit in Winter Quarter 2024

• Will receive the $1,000 ratification bonus (paid in the April pay period)
• Will receive for the $100 multipurpose payment (paid in the May pay period) if eligible
• Will not be eligible for the June 1 stipend increase (in the June pay period)

Only in the Bargaining Unit Spring Quarter 2024

• Will not receive the $1,000 ratification bonus
• Will receive the $100 multipurpose payment (paid in the May pay period) if eligible
• Will be eligible for the June 1 stipend increase (in the June pay period)

Graduate students who are in the bargaining unit in both the Winter 2024 and Spring 2024 Quarters will be eligible for all three of the above benefits, provided they otherwise meet applicable eligibility requirements.

In the future, new appointment letters will outline the scope of work and whether that work qualifies you to be included in the bargaining unit as defined by the CBA. Again, your membership in the bargaining unit, while important, will be less material in the future because Northwestern is choosing to extend some key benefits beyond that group.

Please note that department chairs, directors of graduate studies and other faculty members do not determine bargaining unit status. Rather, it depends on the nature of your work for the University — whether you are performing instructional or research services for Northwestern — and is governed by the terms of the contract. While “instructional services” are defined relatively clearly in the CBA (i.e., someone who exclusively performs grading, tutoring, administrative work, and/or exam proctoring is not in the unit), “research” is less clearly defined and is different by discipline.

If you believe you have been excluded from the bargaining unit in error during a particular quarter or have questions about how the CBA applies to you, please notify your union representatives, who will in turn work with the University to resolve questions. We appreciate the bargaining unit feedback we have received thus far from NUGW-UE, which has helped to refine this new process.

Many people throughout Northwestern are focused on implementing the contract and supporting you and the faculty and staff whose work is impacted. Teams are working on the following and will communicate about these things soon:

• Formalizing the new appointment letter process
• Finalizing labor management collaboration meeting plans with NUGW-UE
• Distributing the ratification bonus in the April pay period
• Distributing the $100 annual multipurpose payment in the May pay period
• Reimbursing eligible graduate students who voluntarily enrolled in individual vision and/or dental insurance for the period now covered by the University (March-August 2024)
• Publishing details regarding the new international graduate student support fund that goes into effect on September 1, 2024

Please continue to check the Union Contract webpage for regularly updated information and FAQs. You may also submit general questions through this online form . Members of the implementation strategy team monitor this form, respond to inquiries promptly and consider issues raised there in ongoing planning.

We realize that this has been a challenging and uncertain transition for you, as it is for many who support your work and study. We appreciate your partnership and contributions.

Kathleen Hagerty Provost and Professor 

Kelly Mayo Dean of The Graduate School and Associate Provost for Graduate Education 

Graduate workers seek ‘substantial’ raise

Following months of surveys, research and internal debate, the Stanford Graduate Workers Union (SGWU) has released its proposed economic platform, centering around “an immediate and substantial pay raise for all graduate workers.”

From April 25 to May 15, all cardholding Union members will be able to vote on whether to accept or reject the platform. Assuming a simple majority of votes affirm the platform, it will serve as the foundation for negotiations between SGWU and the University.

Beyond a pay raise, the platform also seeks to expand access to affordable housing, healthcare and transportation for graduate student workers. At its core, the economic platform seeks to support graduate students in reaching their “maximum potential,” according to Sayush Raj, a third-year Ph.D. candidate in stem cell biology and member of the SGWU Bargaining Committee.

“I really believe that in order for anyone to achieve excellence, they need to be supported by their community, and all of their needs should be fulfilled. They shouldn’t just be trying to survive,” Raj said. “I think that currently [Stanford] just isn’t set up for that.”

For Raj, a key first step in creating this environment is elevating graduate students out of rent-burdened status, which denotes someone paying 30% or more of their salary on rent, as defined by the U.S. Department of Housing and Development. As of 2021, 90% of graduate students fell into this category. Today, the “vast majority” of graduate students remain rent-burdened, said fourth-year physics Ph.D. candidate and SGWU Bargaining Committee member Rory O’Dwyer.

The proposed pay raise seeks to address this matter, according to Chris Gustin, fifth-year Ph.D. candidate in Applied Physics and SGWU Bargaining Committee member.

Gustin explained that the initial draft of compensation proposals is designed to make sure that the large majority of graduate workers would no longer be rent-burdened and would be paid a fair wage that takes into account the Bay Area’s cost of living. 

While an exact number has yet to be finalized by the SGWU, O’Dwyer is encouraged by recent bargaining agreements at Northwestern University, University of Chicago and Johns Hopkins University. Graduate workers at these schools received a 22% , 22% and 40% pay raise respectively. O’Dwyer said that the SGWU will be asking for a similar raise. 

“These are unions that were bargaining for their contract around the same time we are,” O’Dwyer said. “It’s actually quite a good time to be doing what we’re doing right now. A lot of other institutions are getting these sorts of above 20 percent raises in their first year.”

Bargaining committee members also hope to make strides in securing more affordable transportation access for graduate workers. Among their proposals is the return of Caltrain GoPass access for graduate workers. According to Sophie Walton, fourth-year biophysics Ph.D. candidate and SGWU Bargaining Committee member, the committee has seen significant support for bringing back the GoPass. 

Fletcher Chapin, third-year Ph.D. candidate in civil and environmental engineering and SGWU Bargaining Committee member, said that the GoPass’s discontinuation in 2022 inspired his work as a union member. To Chapin, this decision “shows how little Stanford cares about their graduate workers — that they just took away a benefit that many people relied on to get to work daily.”

University spokesperson Dee Mostofi wrote that “Stanford values the many contributions our graduate students make to support the university’s teaching and research mission.”

The SGWU’s economic platform is the organization’s second major set of proposals, following the Union’s “Language Articles.” After months of back-and-forth negotiations between the SGWU and the University, the two parties have only reached a tentative agreement on five of nearly two dozen articles, while the others are still being negotiated on. 

The process for the economic platform is likely to follow a similar timeline, according to O’Dwyer. He said he expects the economic platform to receive a similar level of approval from SGWU voters as the Language Articles, which he said received over 90% of votes in favor of adoption.

Following the approval of the platform by the SGWU body, negotiations with the University are set to follow shortly after, which Mostofi wrote the University remains open and ready for.

“The University looks forward to receiving the union’s proposals at the bargaining table and engaging in productive discussions with the union on those matters,” Mostofi wrote.

While a seemingly long and arduous process for some, according to third-year aeronautics and astronautics Ph.D. candidate Emi Soroka, the eventual results justify the efforts. Referencing a message she’s heard from SGWU leadership, she said, “Every line in our platform will make a difference in someone’s life.”

Luc Alvarez ’25 is a Senior Staff Writer and was a Vol. 263 and Vol. 264 News Managing Editor. A design major originally from Downers Grove, Illinois, he can be found taking in California’s nature while working through CS psets and making niche Spotify playlists. Contact him at lalvarez ‘at’ stanforddaily.com.

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Faculty: Research Assistants FAQs

Dartmouth's Economic Proposals General Strike FAQs Faculty: Strike Information Faculty: Teaching Assistants Faculty: Research Assistants

Can I ask my Research Assistant about their plans to strike?

No, you may not legally ask them if they plan to strike. However, ahead of a strike (and as soon as possible), you can ask RAs to prepare a detailed report on the status of their research and confirm they are caught up with their assigned tasks. You may not ask graduate students to work over their allotted time, but you can ask them to ensure that essential tasks are current.

How can I prepare for my RA going on strike?

Faculty should make plans to ensure that critical research components, such as animals, plants, equipment, and other sensitive research assets, are maintained.  In addition:

• Continue to follow all safety procedures.
• Postpone experiments if requirements for the minimum number of individuals cannot be met.
• Safeguard critical research assets.
• Ensure critical data assets are backed up and accessible.
• Consider preserving critical cell lines and other assets.
• Deliveries of research supplies and materials may be delayed. Order ahead, delay deliveries, or plan alternatives in case of delays.
• Expect that some campus user facilities may be short-staffed during a strike.

One of my RAs has chosen not to strike.

You may not assign additional work to non-striking RAs.

The work my RA is doing on a grant is also the work they are doing for their dissertation. How do I separate RA work from academic work in this instance?

Unfortunately, there is no straightforward way to account for this, but if a striking student wants to continue to do academic research while on strike, they may; however, they will not be paid.

Growing the union: Higher education is on a roll

Higher education organizing has been going full tilt this spring, swelling the ranks of AFT members and strengthening the union’s position as the largest faculty and staff union in the country. Behind each of these new affiliates are the people who work every day to make the education experience of students in public colleges and universities—people who deserve decent pay, job security, academic freedom and a voice in the workplace—the best it can be.

Brown University postdocs

Joining the growing union movement at Brown University, the Brown Postdoc Labor Organization became the first union for postdoctoral researchers and dean’s faculty fellows to unionize on campus. The administration voluntarily recognized the union after signatures from a majority of those eligible for membership were validated, forgoing the usual voting process.

BPLO joins the Rhode Island Federation of Teachers and Health Professionals/AFT Local 6516, in company with Brown’s Labor Organization of Community Coordinators, Graduate Labor Organization and Teaching Assistant Labor Organization. That union solidarity is expected to serve workers on campus well. “Our generation [is] realizing that you can’t just rely on the benevolence of institutions to protect your rights,” postdoctoral research fellow and BPLO organizer Sarah Neville told the Brown Daily Herald. “You have to stand up and be in solidarity with your co-workers to get what you deserve.”

California College of the Arts ranked faculty

In January, faculty at the California College of the Arts won voluntary recognition from the college for its union, CCA Ranked Faculty United . The 130 faculty of the California College of the Arts are framing their commitment with the principle that their working conditions are students’ learning conditions; they are focused on fair compensation and job security, working collaboratively with college leadership to ensure a better future for the college community and fair and transparent decision-making. Their school, founded in 1907, is a private, not-for-profit art school and part of a growing movement of private art schools that are unionizing.

University of Illinois Chicago research assistants

In March, research assistants voted unanimously to join the graduate workers union at the University of Illinois Chicago, the Graduate Employees Organization. It’s a landmark move: The RAs were excluded by state law from unionizing until 2019 because they were not recognized as workers; now they are the first graduate researchers at a public university in their state to unionize. GEO now represents nearly 2,500 teaching, graduate and research assistants. It is one of the first graduate employee unions in the country and began organizing in 1970. The union has been a leader on the following issues, listed on its website: premium-free health insurance, tuition waivers, transgender healthcare, harassment protections, police abolition and more.

Bennington College

Faculty and staff at this private college in Vermont unionized in February , and administrators voluntarily recognized them as the bargaining unit for longtime faculty as well as staff and campus safety workers. Bennington College United says its goals are to “bargain collectively with management as equals, to make real, meaningful improvements on workplace issues that unite us.” Issues members hope to address include workload, turnover and compensation; pay equity across departments; better healthcare; and a “rock-solid recruitment plan” to address enrollment.

University of Michigan-Flint tenure and tenure-track faculty

Tenured and tenure-track faculty at the University of Michigan-Flint were recognized by administrators this spring. Their union, UMF-AAUP-AFT , joins AFT siblings in the Lecturers’ Employee Organization, which spans all three University of Michigan campuses and represents nontenure-track faculty including lecturers, librarians, archivists and curators. Organizers hope to address issues including workload, campus climate, pay equity and protecting the right to speak out on campus issues. “We know that we can build a better university together and that this happens when faculty are respected,” union leaders wrote to campus staff. “Now the real work of sustaining this movement begins.” The union will first come to agreement about who will be eligible to join the unit; then the voting can start.

University of Montana graduate workers

Card check complete, awaiting official recognition In April, a supermajority of the 358 graduate workers at the University of Montana signed union cards . The overwhelming card check means an election is not required; organizers are hoping administrators will voluntarily negotiate with the union as they await the state’s certification. “We seek to improve working and living conditions for graduate employees through a collaborative and non-adversarial relationship with the university administration,” the union wrote in a letter to administrators, noting that low research and teaching stipends are not enough to secure basics like food, housing and healthcare. The union also pointed out that recruiting high-quality graduate students “from diverse backgrounds” is more difficult with low pay. “Only when basic needs are met can graduate employees excel in their roles as educators and researchers, supporting UM’s status as a Tier 1 Research Institution.”

Chesapeake Community College faculty

This spring full time faculty at Chesapeake Community College in Queen Anne’s County, Md., became the fourth community college in the state to join United Academics-Maryland , affiliated with AFT Maryland, after a change in state legislation allowed community college faculty to unionize. “It’s exciting to know that we are striving together as a faculty and negotiating with administration to ensure that working conditions will remain fair and equitable here at Chesapeake College,” said Eleanor Welsh, a professor of English. 

“The changing landscape of higher education demands faculty have a voice and a seat at the table,” said AFT Maryland President Kenya Campbell. “It is vital that educators who will be teaching college graduates of the future be a part of the decision-making process regarding their work and the future of their institution.” Other colleges that recently joined the AFT in Maryland are: Prince George’s Community College, Howard Community College and Frederick Community College.

[Virginia Myers]

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Johns Hopkins graduate student union ratifies first contract

The Johns Hopkins University graduate student workers’ union ratified its first contract agreement with the private Baltimore university last week.

With the contract approved April 18, members of Teachers and Researchers United, or TRU, made up of Ph.D. students teaching or conducting research while earning their degrees, have become some of the highest-paid graduate workers compared with the cost of living in the country.

TRU wrote on the social platform X that 1,754 voters ratified the contract with 99.5% in favor.

“…this contract has been made possible by your contributions,” TRU wrote to members. “Every card signature, discussion with coworkers, attendance at a meeting/demonstration, or pledge to withhold labor helped get us to where we are today. This is your contract, you won it. Be proud!”

TRU’s 22-member bargaining committee and Hopkins representatives agreed to a tentative contract on March 29 that sets a minimum stipend of $47,000 per year, guarantees stipends for four years of a five-year degree and provides up to 12 weeks of paid parental leave.

Hopkins spokesperson Megan Christin said in an emailed statement that the union members “engaged so constructively throughout the bargaining process.”

“As the birthplace of doctoral education in America, we recognize this as an opportunity to ensure JHU continues to build on its legacy of not only providing world-class doctoral education and training but developing innovative new approaches to supporting our PhDs in achieving personal and professional success,” the statement reads.

TRU did not immediately respond to requests for comment Thursday.

The three-year agreement will have stipends start at $47,000 in July and increase to $50,000 by the second year, then a 4% increase in year three. Graduate workers each receive a one-time $1,000 signing bonus for ratifying the contract.

The contract also includes paid health benefits for children and some spouses, parental leave benefits and increased vacation and sick time. If not otherwise specified in the contract, benefits and protections took effect immediately, TRU posted.

“We are confident this newly ratified contract will allow Hopkins PhD programs to offer highly competitive funding packages and continue building on our nearly 150-year-old tradition of recruiting some of brightest minds and most promising talent in the world to study here in Baltimore,” Hopkins President Ron Daniels and Provost Ray Jayawardhana wrote in a message to faculty.

Last year, over 3,300 Hopkins Ph.D. students voted to unionize with a 97% vote, making Hopkins one of many elite higher education institutions to certify a graduate student union. TRU’s next step is writing a constitution, “so we can elect officers, support grievances, and more!” the union posted on X.

“Everybody is getting paid fairly, and there aren’t these tiers that the university created in the past,” TRU member Andrew Eneim told The Baltimore Sun when the union reached an agreement with the university.

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UNM grad student union rallies for raises and respect from the university

The University of New Mexico’s graduate student workers’ union rallied outside of the administration building Tuesday. The United Graduate Workers are calling for raises that include research assistants and for the university’s bargaining committee to treat their union with respect.

Union member Wilber Dominguez is a research assistant in the physics department. He said he makes less than $2,000 a month and is concerned about affording rent as his lease is set to expire. He recently got SNAP benefits, or “food stamps,” to help make ends meet.

“So, these are a lot of concerns that I, as a graduate worker, should not be thinking about,” he said. “I should be worried about my research, about outputting good results.”

According to the university’s Basic Needs Survey , 55% of UNM graduate students on Albuquerque’s main campus receive some kind of food assistance. Additionally, 61% are housing insecure.

Research assistants were left out of the last two rounds of raises the union negotiated. Dominguez pointed out that’s despite the fact that UNM is the state’s only R1 institution, a classification for universities with “very high research activity.”

“A lot of what makes UNM UNM, and a strong R1 institution, is research assistants,” he said.

United Graduate Workers member Max Pagano is a teacher’s assistant who makes about $1,600 a month teaching Latin.

“I just want to make sure that I can keep doing that and that more people can do that after me,” they said.

For that to happen, Pagano said graduate student workers need to make a living wage. According to the MIT living wage calculator , that’s about $41,600 in Albuquerque. UNM graduate workers make about half of that on average, according to the union.

Pagano said the union is also calling on the administration to negotiate with the group respectfully.

“Right now, a really big goal is to get an offer that feels like we’re being taken seriously,” they said.

While a spokesperson for the university declined to comment on the details of the active negotiation, the union said its current offer is 4% raises with the option to exclude research assistants. Pagano said that has not changed since the union announced the rally, but they hope the demonstration will create some movement.

The University of New Mexico holds KUNM’s license but has no input on our editorial content.

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Over 200 Penn faculty express support for graduate student workers seeking unionization

GET-UP rallied in front of College Hall to support graduate student workers' push for union recognition on Oct. 4, 2023. 

Over 200 Penn faculty members expressed their support for Penn’s graduate student workers organization, which is facing an ongoing battle to unionize and gain University recognition.  

During the past year, hundreds of members of Graduate Employees Together — University of Pennsylvania have filed cards expressing their desire to form a union. In response, 224 Penn faculty members affirmed their right to organize by signing a support statement drafted by the American Association of University Professors . 

Several professors who spoke with The Daily Pennsylvanian said they were motivated to support GET-UP due to their own experience with labor organizing. History professor Kathleen Brown attributed her support for GET-UP to her personal experience as a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin. During her time as a Ph.D. student, Brown contributed to the unionization efforts of teaching assistants. 

“I was a steward for my department during the election that led to the creation of the union,” she told the DP. “Having had this experience, it would be difficult for me not to support an organizing effort led by graduate students.” 

224 Penn Faculty | Statement in support of graduate worker unionization

Penn union coalition, local elected officials call on University to stop union-busting

Originally, the student group was set to vote on whether to unionize on April 16 and 17. However, the election was postponed, and on Monday, GET-UP announced that the election has been rescheduled to May 1 and 2 in Bodek Lounge.

The decision to push back election dates came after GET-UP’s appeal against Penn’s attempt to exclude certain groups of workers from voting. On April 11 , the student group announced that they had won their appeal and continued to urge graduate students to vote in the election.

The issues the group seeks to address include safe, fair, and transparent working conditions; financial security; protections against discrimination and harassment; and healthcare benefits. 

History and Sociology of Science professor Harun Küçük highlighted the significance of ensuring fair wages for graduate students. 

“The hardest topic to talk about is also the most important, which is monetary compensation,” he told the DP. “Although Penn has recently increased the graduate stipends by a substantial margin, we are still relatively behind our peers. This calls for something to be done, and our students have decided to take matters into their own hands.” 

Beginning in the 2023-2024 academic school year, Penn increased the minimum stipend from $30,457 to $38,000. This stipend still remains slightly less than the Ivy League’s average minimum stipend of $39,226 .

“Universities are places for self-fulfillment, and the work that we do is on that path,” Küçük said. “If students are financially burdened, they are not in the proper position to fully live this out.”

Russian and East European Studies and political science professor Mitchell Orenstein pointed out the historical impact of unions in the United States. He added that, during his time as a graduate student at Yale, he was an organizer for their graduate student union, Local 33-UNITE HERE.

“The pay at the time was atrocious and effectively unlivable,” he told the DP. “When we organized, after many tough battles, the University nearly tripled our salaries.”

Orenstein also expressed optimism for GET-UP’s future achievements.

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“I think that the best proof that the unionization efforts have worked at Penn is the responsiveness of the administration before the union is officially voted on,” he said. “The student group has already made a major impact and I believe they will continue to do that.”

GET-UP has advised graduates to remain attentive to updates, especially those pertaining to the upcoming election. 

“I hope that for the sake of campus democracy, as many graduate students [as possible] come out to vote,” Küçük said.

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Johns Hopkins graduate students win first union contract

After a nearly year-long negotiation, graduate students at Johns Hopkins University are working under their first union contract — which members ratified last week.

The Teachers and Researchers United group staged protests and signed strike pledges in recent months to push university leaders towards adopting their demands. Both parties reached a tentative agreement on March 29, which union members adopted last Thursday by a 99.5% vote.

“Our asks were really ambitious at the table, but we ended up achieving a contract that everybody felt really well represented by and they were just happy to vote yes for,” said Jayati Sharma, a member of the union’s bargaining committee and a PhD student in epidemiology. “We won more than we thought we could achieve.”

The union, which currently represents more than 3,200 student members, formed in 2023, and has been negotiating its first contract since last May. Johns Hopkins students join a growing wave of graduate unions popping up nationwide.

“We are enormously grateful to the faculty and divisional representatives from across the university who contributed their time, input, and expertise to this effort, as well as to the PhD student workers and union members on the TRU-UE bargaining team who engaged so constructively throughout the bargaining process,” a university spokesperson said in an emailed statement.

Sharma said the bargaining committee was at the table with leaders until 8:45 p.m. on March 28. But the end result was worth it, she said.

“There are so many wins, that it is hard to remember them all,” she said.

Sharma said the headliner win is an increase in yearly stipend pay to $47,000 from an average of $33,000, which varies wildly between departments. Graduate workers will start receiving that increased wage on July 1.

The new contract also includes many benefits that union leaders say are “historic firsts” for graduate student unions — like financial support for visa fees, the right to protest without being met by force, and free transit passes in D.C. and Baltimore.

“Hopkins University doesn't really have a great transit system for students and employees,” Sharma said. “So we proposed a simple measure that would rectify that, while also investing resources into the city that we all call home.”

Emily Hoppe, a PhD student in the school of nursing, applauded the union’s wins for parents and caregivers — like up to 12 weeks of paid leave for birthing parents, subsidies for children or adult dependents and a health insurance plan that covers spouses and dependents.

“It just really makes it possible for parents and caregivers to come to the program,” Hoppe said. “If I could have had this with my own child at my previous workplace, it would have made my life much better.”

Andrew Eneim, a biophysics PhD student, has been involved in the union’s organizing efforts for the past four years. He said the union’s commitment to solidarity translated directly to these first-time wins.

“The reason they're historic is because they don't always affect everybody equally,” he said. “And so sometimes that gets lost in the shuffle of trying to achieve some goals. I feel really proud of our members for being willing to fight for things that may not directly affect them.”

Eneim says the work is far from over. Now, the union has to focus on enforcing the new contract — and cementing its own structure by electing leaders.

“I think it's hard to imagine if we kept fighting how much more we could have gotten,” he said. “But that's what the next contract fight is for.”

Hoppe said it’s all about making the contract “mean something more than just the words on the paper.”

“This is not just going to make all of the things that members had concerns about disappear,” she said. “We had to fight hard for the contract that we won. And we're probably going to have to fight for some of the aspects of its enforcement as well.”

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