Clark U, Graduate Union Reach Deal to End Strike.Clark Graduate Union on Strike for Contract.Student resident assistant unions gain traction.Arguing that the action would negatively affect others on campus and that undergraduate students “who are on the margins often bear the greatest burden of such a work stoppage,” he said that a strike is “unacceptable and does not reflect the academic community we all strive to create at IU.” “I do not believe that we need a union to improve graduate education and I will not re-visit this decision,” Rahul Shrivastav, provost since February, wrote to faculty members earlier this month, ahead of the then-looming strike. In Indiana, public institutions may voluntarily recognize unions, but they’re not obligated to do so, and they’re not obligated to engage in collective bargaining with any unions they do recognize.Īt IU, in particular, the university’s provost has said the new graduate assistants’ union isn’t getting what it wants. Graduate assistant collective bargaining rights at private universities are overseen by the National Labor Relations Board, but public-sector graduate student union rights vary from state to state. Strikers say they’re planning for a weeklong work stoppage. Eerie but perfectly aligned desks in the building designed to hold thousands of constantly moving and flowing students.” One IU faculty member shared a photo of an empty classroom on Twitter, for instance, writing that this is what it looks like “when graduate students strike and undergrads walkout in solidarity. Hundreds of graduate assistants have protested on picket lines since the work stoppage began, with undergraduate students in some cases walking out of class in solidarity. The union held a strike authorization vote this month, with 1,008 voters approving the strike plan and 23 voting no, of 2,500 eligible graduate assistants total. The university resisted, arguing in a February memo to the newly formed union that the “average actual value of graduate student support (stipend, additional fellowships and grants, tuition remission and health/dental benefits) is in fact over $50,000,” and that “IU has been very responsive to the concerns and needs of graduate students, and we continue to look for feasible ways to improve all aspects of the IU graduate student experience, including stipends and benefits.” (The university also said that graduate assistants’ working hours were capped at 20 per week and that they were therefore not full-time employees.) Prior to striking, some 1,600 graduate assistants signed union cards seeking recognition from IU. How to write an effective diversity statement (essay).Similar to numerous other graduate assistant unions in recent years, particularly following the Me Too movement, the IU union wants a formal grievance procedure that ends third-party binding arbitration for disputes that can’t be settled at the department or at the college level. students and more for international students.īeyond financials, strikers want improved benefits-such as expanded mental health-care coverage and guaranteed time off for year-round employees-and more protections for international student assistants. They also want to see the elimination of student fees that cut into their stipends, to the tune of $1,350 per year for U.S. Strikers, who began their work stoppage Wednesday, are asking for better pay, to help bridge the gap between minimum stipends that were until recently under $18,000 and the current estimated cost of living for a single person in Bloomington ( some $26,600, after taxes). Graduate assistants at Indiana University at Bloomington are on strike as they seek both union recognition and collective bargaining powers from their institution.
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