Why not negotiate?

It’s puzzling that NYU President John Sexton would be resistant to the idea of negotiating with elected representatives of NYU’s graduate assistants. Grad assistants at any university aren’t “simply” students, nor is their work exactly like that of other employees. Universities and their graduate assistants are in a unique relationship — but one in which good-faith bargaining, mutually-agreed contractual obligations, and the respect they engender, can improve both graduate education and undergraduate instruction. Rather than issue ultimatums, NYU should recognize the unique nature of graduate employment, and respond with flexibility and common sense. As an NYU parent, I’d like to see the strike settled quickly, through negotiations, without the hard feelings and weak morale a strong-arm approach will surely create. If the interests of undergraduates are genuinely foremost, NYU and GSOC should return to serious negotiations, until both sides are satisfied. An amicable settlement is still possible, but time may be running out. Threats of future punishment certainly won’t help.

Tony Affigne, PhD, Chair of Political Science at Providence College, at 8:11 am EST on November 29, 2005

Making the case

This move by the NYU administration makes it plain that the university does, in fact, rely upon the labor of their graduate student assistants as well as supporting their scholarly pursuits. No “student” has their financial aid cut for staging a protest or a walk-out. Only workers can be penalized with pay-cuts and firing. The university has proven the union’s point and made it clearer than ever that they’ve been using graduate assistants as cheap labor while offering them none of the rights or benefits that workers should receive. Their too-little-too-late offers of increased pay, better benefits, or more favorable teaching schedules are all well and good—but again, it’s an acknowledgement that these things have been lacking in the past. Had they treated their graduate assistants with some modicum of fairness and respect to begin with, they would have likely never had to deal with a union or a walk-out. Whether these students win or lose, it should serve as fair warning to other universities who take advantage of graduate students, adjuncts, and visiting assistants on a regular basis. I just hope there are enough graduate students who are willing or able to take the two-semester suspension on principle, and let the university struggle with the consequences. You’ve invited these students to be a part of a “community” that treats them as second-class citizens. As in the film, “A Day Without A Mexican,” I’d like to see how the university does for “A Year Without A Grad Student”

huntly, at 9:14 am EST on November 29, 2005

The union has acted in good faith with the university, and it certainly has never done anything that merits NYU’s extreme response. In making its case for breaking the union, the university publicly (and very quietly) points to two grievances that were filed by TAs who were not paid the same wages or given the same health care that other unionized TAs had at the time (both were settled in favor of the university). And in any case, GSOC already offered in June to take any other standing grievance to which NYU objected on academic grounds off the table, as a compromise offer to spur talks. NYU, however, ignored this offer, despite their claims that these grievances had constituted the obstacle to a new contract. Who’s acting in bad faith here?

All the union is demanding is negotiations for a new contract. Instead of taking this reasonable route, Sexton prefers to provoke a strike, risk the university’s and the graduate school’s reputation, and poison the atmosphere on campus for years to come, not to mention disrupting the fall and perhaps spring semester, all in spite of the broad support the union has had among GAs and faculty. It’s the height of arrogance and, yes, bad faith—settling this dispute would have been so easy. All it would have taken was sitting down at a table with GSOC.

Grad student, NYU, at 11:11 am EST on November 29, 2005

I have several workstudy and GA students who work under me in my department. I am glad to say that none of them felt the need to participate in the strike. Nor have any in the departments close to mine. They feel that for roughly 20hrs of work a week they leave the university clear of any debts.

Broken down, a TA/GA student will recieve over $55,000 a year in compensation (tuition remission, bi-monthly paycheck, health insurance, etc) for the work they do. This all for 20hrs a week. They make far more then I do as a faculty member.

I, myself, went through the same process going through graduate school. It has always been my belief that the TA/GA was a form of scholarship and not employment. It is a recruitment tool used to bring in the very best and the brightest students to our university.

I’m all for people getting as much as they can out of the university, but I feel this strike is more for UAWs chance to keep their foot in the door at education institutions then it is for our own Grad Students.

The picket signs all say ‘UAW on Strike’ by the way, and not GSOC or Grad Students on Strike.

NYU Worker, at 11:59 am EST on November 29, 2005

“watching sadly,” I applaude you. I completely agree with you.

Ryan, at 12:51 pm EST on November 29, 2005

Excuse me — what about the students?

What about the students — who are now “between a rock and a hard place?” In hospital strikes, there are notification periods so patients can be diverted to other facilities. (Hmm .. maybe this is why one of the Olson twins dropped out of NYU ..).

For their sake, I hope the financially-weakest NYU students did NOT enroll this semester. IMHO, neither labor or management appears to care much about their well-being.

Going forward, every student should be aware of this potentiality, and avoid them. That would send a message — resolve prior to school’s start.

A.D., Dismayed by both sides at the sidelines, at 3:05 pm EST on November 29, 2005

You say NYU is not investing its resources in hiring fulltime faculty. Seems you are not very informed about your statements. Sometimes it pays to do the research before opening your big mouth.

http://www.nyu.edu/nyutoday/archives/18/02/PageOneStories/partners.html

Cyber Kitty Super Star, Reader of Information, at 4:57 pm EST on November 29, 2005

They aren’t on strike, they’re assaulting 3rd parties

I’m in industry, not academia and have been on both sides of the labor/management divide during my career. The Grad students aren’t on strike because they are affecting uninvolved third parties, not witholding their work product.

When the UAW strikes GM, they quit making autos and they quit receiving paychecks. GM immediately loses vehicles which they could sell. The grad students are not doing anything which directly affects NYU management. What they are doing by not teaching classes is equivalent to the UAW going to downtown Detroit and shooting the tires out on every third GM vehicle they pass. Neither those Detroit automobile owners nor the undergraduates are directly involved in the disupute with management.

If they want to play in the union world, let them withold their own work product...their research. That puts pressure directly on the management as senior faculty’s grant’s are unfulfilled and management loses the portion dedicated to overhead from the next grant. That puts pressure on folks who actually have power to affect grant the grad student’s requests, not on undergraduates, the peons of the academic world.

JimK, at 7:36 pm EST on November 29, 2005

Misunderstanding of labor issues

Kevin: What makes you think that the laborers have “arbitrarily decided how much they think is necessary to live on"? Cost-of-living in a given city is pretty easy to determine, and it doesn’t take much work to put together some data on average costs for graduate student housing, bills, groceries, books, transportation, medical expenses, etc. When I was a graduate student, we did just that, and found that the average stipend left most graduate students (especially in the humanities and social sciences) several thousand dollars in the hole every year. This debt was piled on top of old school loans, travel expenses, and unexpected costs that weren’t even figured into the equation. The situation hasn’t changed all that much at many schools. The inevitable consequence is that only those students with family support, side income, or inherited money (i.e. the financially privileged) are able to take advantage of such higher education and the academic or professional careers that follow. There’s a lot of talk about “diversifying” higher education along political lines—well, that’s not going to happen so long as there’s an economic “glass ceiling” that permits only those from particular economic and social categories to be trained as academics. This labor dispute, like all labor disputes, has social and political as well as economic consequences. When the pay and benefits of academic work at all levels begins to match up with the amount of time and training and labor required to do that work, then maybe we’ll start to see more “diversity” in academia.

huntly, at 8:47 am EST on December 1, 2005

Whose Job?

There are many, many urban studies done that have established the poverty line in the metropolitan areas that surround academic institutions in the northeast. (I don’t know about elsewhere, but I think it’s a safe bet to assume it goes on there too.)

So, my dear undergraduate, let’s do a bit of simple mathematics, shall we?

The poverty line for a single individual was $14,000 in 2000 in metropolitan area X. This amount was calculated by examining the average rent in the area, average annual utilities, and other costs of basic living. It DID NOT include health care, a car, child care, or taxes, things that many of the undergraduates that I taught considered a nuisance because they didn’t have kids, they were on their parents’ healthcare, they were probably given or loaned a car, and they griped about taxes only because it left less money for spending on CDs and beer.

In 2000, I made $12,000 for my work as a GA. I elected not to pay the minimal amount for my health care (because my institution is more merciful than some) because I needed that money for rent. Oh—this was also before taxes. And I paid fees to my institution and paid for books. Standard stuff.

I was lucky: I didn’t have a family to support like a number of my friends. But I did have a car payment, and I lived alone. My choice, and I was able to make it because I also worked a freelance job, which I really wasn’t supposed to work because my institution put a cap on the number of hours a GA was permitted to work outside of teaching. I got by essentially because I cheated. Some of my friends did have to choose between paying the phone bill and paying for books, and many of us lived very much hand to mouth, from check to check. There were a number of times when I gave one of my colleagues a ride to the bank because the walk was long and the weather sweltering. Like I said, I was lucky, and stubborn.

Many, many, many GAs and TAs live below the poverty line but, because an advanced degree is seen as a privilege, no one really cares. It is apparently my privilege to grade your papers, to stand before you and lecture, to research and write and think for a living.

Until that attitude changes, GAs are going to be shafted every time because they will not be able to win the support they need to show that, in exchange for this deep love for what they study, they often trade their peace of mind and sometimes end up worrying about whether the lights will stay on this month, or can they afford to get that bothersome tooth extracted, and where can they do so cheaply. These workers, particularly those who come here to study from elsewhere, are being exploited, and need representation so that they can live decently.

Barbara Ehrenreich should do a book about us.

Excant, No longer a TA, at 9:45 am EST on December 10, 2005