BY THE AAUP COMMITTEE ON GRADUATE AND PROFESSIONAL STUDENTS Over the past nine months, graduate employees at private universities have faced vicious campaigns and legal challenges from university administrations as they have attempted to exercise their freedom to join together in a union to negotiate collectively for better working conditions. The American Association of University…
POSTED BY HANK REICHMAN The following open letter to Yale University President Peter Salovey appeared yesterday in the Yale Daily News. Dear President Salovey: As members of the Yale Law faculty, we write to express our disagreement with your May 3, 2017 public letter regarding graduate student teaching fellow unionization. In the letter, you suggest that…
POSTED BY KELLY HAND Today, a strong majority of graduate employees at the University of Chicago filed authorization cards with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to hold a formal union recognition election. Members of Graduate Students United (GSU) personally visited the regional NLRB office to deliver the cards, signed by grad workers from seven…
BY LAURA MARKWARDT Graduate workers with COGS at the University of Iowa are struggling for a fair contract in the midst of state legislation against working people in the public sector. COGS celebrated their 20th Anniversary last year, and the gains they’ve made for graduate employees and students over this time are being quickly erased. Today, COGS holds an action at the University of…
BY HANK REICHMAN Iowa State University has lost an appeal in a federal free speech lawsuit that affirms student rights regardless of political viewpoint, the Des Moines Register reports. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit ruled February 13 that school administrators, including President Steven Leath, violated the First Amendment rights of two…
BY MICHAEL MERANZE The following post by UCLA history professor Michael Meranze is reposted by permission from the Remaking the University blog that he runs along with UC Santa Barbara professor Christopher Newfield. As you may recall, a bill to eliminate tenure was recently introduced into the Iowa State Senate. After a good deal of…
POSTED BY MARTIN KICH Here are excerpts from two articles for Huffington Post on Andy Puzder, President Trump’s nominee to be Secretary of Labor. The first excerpt is from Ryan Grim’s nightly newsletter: When I was in high school and working in the Washington College dining hall kitchen, where I swear it was 120 degrees,…
BY KELLY HAND With the inauguration of president-elect Donald Trump just two days away, and with legislators in several states targeting higher education—through efforts to eliminate tenure (Iowa and Missouri) and specific courses or programs (Wisconsin and Arizona)—there is an urgent need for faculty to take action to protect academic freedom and quality higher education. The…