Grad Student 'Bill of Rights' re: funding, hours, etc.

[MedievalMadness]

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/02/18/u-texas-grad-students-push-bill-rights-secure-better-support

This was in today's Inside Higher Ed. UT Austin's grad student committee put together a draft bill of rights in the spirit of all the unionizing that's been going on lately.

Well worth reading -- especially for those of you who were accepted there.

(Also, in case you guys don't already follow this publication, I highly recommend it. They send one email digest a day with articles pertaining to university life and academia. They also have a lot of jobs listings.)

[ryhmesandammo]

Thanks so much for sharing!

[TakeruK]

I think this is a good thing to do and I find it encouraging that some US schools are starting to follow the Canadian system of unionizing graduate TAs (and in many places, RAs, as well) to develop/protect these rights. 

 

I do wonder about the quoted disparity in TA pay though. At schools in Canada, all TAs are paid the same base hourly rate (about $40/hour), no matter if you are supervising a Physics lab, leading an English class discussion, or proctoring an auditorium of Chemistry midterms. I think this is the fair way to go. It's also not generally true that all disciplines are paid the same stipend, and I think funding availability should in some way depend on the "market". The disparity between Science PhDs and Arts/Humanities PhDs is pretty small though in Canada. The biggest difference is generally the source of funding. At my MSc school, while all TAs are paid the same hourly rate, almost all of an English PhD's student funding came from TA work while for me, as a science student, only 1/3 of my funding came from TA work, which freed up a lot more of my time to work on my degree.

 

I think students themselves are a big hurdle to overcome when it comes to something like this. At some point, resources are a zero sum game, and those in better-off positions (I think generally true that science students are better funded) might fear losing some of their privileges. I volunteered as the Physics department steward for my MSc school's TA union and the majority of science students I talked to were either against the union or completely uninterested! This leads to fewer science students involvement in the union and increased suspicion/misinformation that the Arts/Humanities students were taking over the union and following their own agenda. I tried my best to provide correct information when possible, but it was very hard especially when at the beginning, I was one of the very few science students involved! 

 

My main reasoning to argue for something like a union even when we're in a privileged position is that it's far better to have these benefits in writing and protect them (practical) as well as ensuring equality for all types of students/fields (idealistic). Also, a lot of what unions protect are disadvantaged students--those with high medical costs, or increased costs through dependents, or international students who might not be familiar with the norms and ensures the same rights for everyone. So, everyone gets sick leave and everyone gets conference leave, it's not a matter of how nice of a supervisor you have nor how much "skill" you have in interacting with your profs (in reality, those with parents in academia or did their undergrad at a school with more professor interactions will have an unfair advantage in knowing the norms of interacting with academics). And even for those who have it all, there's no guarantee that we'll always have it unless we have it on contract. Unfortunately, I feel that most people will not know the importance of a "Bill of Rights"/unionization until they actually need it themselves.

 

Other things those who are thinking of a "bill of rights" etc could consider (things in parentheses were in contracts at schools I've been to):

 

1. Sick leave from scheduled TA work (for yourself being sick as well as family members, unpaid leave but it's the department job to find a replacement, not you when you are sick. however it's best to find someone yourself and trade classes so that you still get paid).

2. Better paternity/maternity leave (we have 1 year of leave per child, all "clocks" get stopped--maximum TA time, time to quals/comps/defenses)

3. Conference leave (1 week unpaid leave--the department can choose to reschedule your time though so you still fulfill your commitment and still get paid).

4. Cost of living stipend increases (usually 1% to 2% per year)

5. An agreement to not increase tuition/fees to cancel out #4 above

6. A published priority system/protocol for how TAships are assigned so that there is a fair and transparent process.

7. An official grievance system for students to bring up unfair treatment as well as job protection and legal protection against retaliatory actions due to student complaints. 

8. Legal counsel provided by the union against the school if necessary.

[Eigen]

So has the NLB reversed it's last ruling that graduate students could not be considered employees and unionize?

 

Last I recall, that was the major barrier to such unionization. 

[TakeruK]

So has the NLB reversed it's last ruling that graduate students could not be considered employees and unionize?

 

Last I recall, that was the major barrier to such unionization. 

 

I didn't know there was a national ruling regarding the status of graduate students as employees and had always thought it was up to each school to decide? As the linked article states, the entire University of California system has unionized TAs. To clarify though, the unionized examples I gave above were at Canadian schools, and in Canada, graduate students are considered both students and employees and there is a lot of effort put into separating these roles. For example, student related pay (e.g. fellowships, scholarships) are paid through the school's Financial Aid department and usually come once per semester while employment related pay (e.g. RA, TAships) are paid biweekly or monthly and they come through the Human Resources department. We get different pay stubs, tax forms etc. separating these income sources. Generally, PhD programs publish a list of program requirements (certain courses, attending seminars, thesis work completed etc.) and when we work towards these goals, we are considered students. All of our employment related duties are contracted so that clearly defines when we are to be considered employees.

 

I think the difference is that in the US (for example, my current program), graduate students are just paid a lump sum, split into whatever pay periods, but there's often very little distinction to us where the money comes from. And, for some reason, graduate programs here are allowed to make employment related work into "academic requirements" (i.e. they require us to TA to get our degree). I am guessing this doesn't happen in Canada because the union Collective Agreement always stipulates that all unionized work must be performed by unionized employees and follow the Agreement, so it's not possible for Canadian schools to make TAing a requirement to get a PhD. I personally think that all PhD students should TA for personal development but it's a shady practice to make what is normally paid work into a "training experience" to avoid (directly) paying students and thus avoid having to call them employees.

 

So I guess after whatever legal barriers are passed (somehow the University of California has done this?), convincing the entire student population to undergo a major change might be the hardest part of unionization (especially since the lifetime of a graduate student is fairly short). But if there are legal barriers and a school's population want them to change, this would usually require a lot of action on part of the students. And then it's the same barrier of convincing a majority of the students to want this change!

[aGiRlCalLeDApPlE]

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/02/18/u-texas-grad-students-push-bill-rights-secure-better-support

This was in today's Inside Higher Ed. UT Austin's grad student committee put together a draft bill of rights in the spirit of all the unionizing that's been going on lately.

Well worth reading -- especially for those of you who were accepted there.

(Also, in case you guys don't already follow this publication, I highly recommend it. They send one email digest a day with articles pertaining to university life and academia. They also have a lot of jobs listings.)

Why this makes me unwilling to pursue grad degree abroad? I can't leave in another country and come back with debts, it's undoable! Plus, I have a dependent, so if I'm not sure we'll both live a decent (not fancy) life until I finish my degree, then why do it? I have a prestigious job here, but I just want to study abroad to educate myself ... This is depressing!

[Eigen]

NLB has to rule on the ability to unionize. 

 

See the problems MIT & Yale are currently having, and the back and forth on Brown. 

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graduate_student_unionization is a good summary. 

 

Basically, it seems like each case that comes up before the NLB gets handled differently, which shifts the precedents back and forth. 

 

State supreme courts can hear an appeal of rulings, and that's whats happened in some states that have allowed unionization. 

 

Cal State schools are a really bad example, though, since they didn't get accepted into a teaching union or anything related to higher ed, but are rather subsumed into the United Auto Workers union.... And apparently, get very little say in what happens at the collective bargaining table, with UAW just handling it. 

[TakeruK]

NLB has to rule on the ability to unionize. 

 

See the problems MIT & Yale are currently having, and the back and forth on Brown. 

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graduate_student_unionization is a good summary. 

 

Basically, it seems like each case that comes up before the NLB gets handled differently, which shifts the precedents back and forth. 

 

State supreme courts can hear an appeal of rulings, and that's whats happened in some states that have allowed unionization. 

 

Cal State schools are a really bad example, though, since they didn't get accepted into a teaching union or anything related to higher ed, but are rather subsumed into the United Auto Workers union.... And apparently, get very little say in what happens at the collective bargaining table, with UAW just handling it. 

 

Interesting info about the NLB. 

 

I don't think it's that uncommon for unionized workers to be in a union where the name of the union or the "trade" of the union does not directly match what the work is. When I worked for Chrysler, I was in the Canadian Auto Workers union, but a lot of CAW locals are other types of manufacturing plants, nothing to do with cars at all. In Canada, most TA unions are actually "Public Service" sector type unions. The union at UBC is part of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (which also represent government workers, city workers etc.) and the union at Queen's is a Local of the Public Service Alliance of Canada. It's a better match than United Auto Workers though, because at least it's true that University employees are all part of the public sector/public service. 

 

It's usually true that collective bargaining is led by a representative from the Union, not graduate students on campus, mostly because what do graduate students know about bargaining? It's far better to have a trained negotiator, assuming that the person is skilled. I would be worried if our negotiator only has experience working with e.g. car companies though, instead of universities, but if you are one of the first graduate student unions in the country, I guess you don't really have much choice in picking those who are experienced in your line of work.

 

However, in a well run union, all of the decision making power and executive members should all be part of the local they are representing, i.e. graduate students. It's the Executive's job to gather feedback from their members and make sure the Union Negotiator priorities match members' needs in the Collective Bargaining process. Frustratingly, there is often a destructive cycle where certain members don't want to interact with the union because they don't feel their needs are being met, so then the union cannot know about their needs etc. In the past, I found that there is a lot of differences in the way different departments treat their TAs and we all thought the way we were being treated was universal across campus. It takes a lot of good communication in order to have one effective collective voice.