Temple University Graduate Students Association | |
| Founded | September 26, 2001 |
|---|---|
| Headquarters | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S. |
| Location | |
Parent organization | American Federation of Teachers |
| Affiliations | AFL–CIO |
| Website | www.tugsa.org |
The Temple University Graduate Students Association (TUGSA) is a graduate employee union that is located at Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the United States. [1]
During the fall of 2001, the Labor Relations Board of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania ruled that graduate students at Temple University must be classified as employees of the university and, as such employees, had the right to unionize. [2]
On March 28, 2001, graduate students at Temple University voted 290 to 16 to form a graduate student union and begin collective bargaining to improve their pay and benefits. It became known as the Temple University Graduate Students Association (also known as TUGSA). [3] [4]
Although Temple executives filed a challenge, in May 2001, to the state labor board's ruling, arguing for a second time that, although graduate students were "paid to teach undergraduates and assist professors in their research," they were still "primarily students and therefore should not have the right to unionize." After deliberating, the state labor board ruled in favor of the students, allowing TUGSA to proceed with its unionization efforts. In June and September 2001, TUGSA members participated in public rallies to pressure Temple's leadership to agree to collective bargaining. [5] [6]
TUGSA subsequently won the battle on September 26, 2001, when Temple's board of trustees voted to recognize the union. Its members ratified TUGSA's first contract with the university on May 18, 2002, after the trustees had voted to approve it on May 14. [7] [8]
Although graduate employees had formed unions in other states since 1970, the TUGSA contract marked the first time that graduate employees in Pennsylvania were able to successfully bargain a contract with their employer. TUGSA is affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers/AFL–CIO. [9]
On November 11, 2022, TUGSA members voted 99% in favor of authorizing a strike. On January 31, 2023, TUGSA officially went on strike, citing grievances with Temple University Administration over negotiating a new collective bargaining agreement. [10] An initial tentative agreement would be voted down by union membership, with 83% of members voting and 92% rejecting the deal. A second tentative agreement would be reached, with 97% voting in favor of the deal. [11] The strike lasted 42 days, attracting attention from local politicians like Malcolm Kenyatta, as well as national figures like Bernie Sanders. [12]
Like the first contract for GSOC at New York University, the first TUGSA contract resulted in significant improvements for the graduate employees in terms of their healthcare and wages. The contract was also significant in that it marked the first time that Temple University allowed same sex domestic partners to enroll in its health plan.
Collective bargaining is a process of negotiation between employers and a group of employees aimed at agreements to regulate working salaries, working conditions, benefits, and other aspects of workers' compensation and rights for workers. The interests of the employees are commonly presented by representatives of a trade union to which the employees belong. A collective agreement reached by these negotiations functions as a labour contract between an employer and one or more unions, and typically establishes terms regarding wage scales, working hours, training, health and safety, overtime, grievance mechanisms, and rights to participate in workplace or company affairs. Such agreements can also include 'productivity bargaining' in which workers agree to changes to working practices in return for higher pay or greater job security.
Mexican labor law governs the process by which workers in Mexico may organize labor unions, engage in collective bargaining, and strike. Current labor law reflects the historic interrelation between the state and the Confederation of Mexican Workers, the labor confederation officially aligned with the Institutional Revolutionary Party, which ruled Mexico under various names for more than seventy years.
The Animation Guild, IATSE Local 839, also known as The Animation Guild, or TAG is a professional guild and union of animation artists, writers and technicians. The full name of the organization is The Animation Guild and Affiliated Optical Electronic and Graphic Arts, Local 839 of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees and Moving Picture Technicians, Artists and Allied Crafts of the United States, its Territories and Canada, American Federation of Labor-Congress of Industrial Organizations/Canadian Labour Congress.
The Graduate Student Organizing Committee (GSOC) is a labor union representing graduate teaching and research assistants at New York University (NYU).
The Federation of Hospital And University Employees is a coalition of labor unions in New Haven, Connecticut, United States, which represents thousands of workers at Yale University and Yale New Haven Hospital. The federation currently includes recognized unions UNITE HERE Locals 34 and 35, which represent university food service, maintenance, and custodial workers, and clerical and technical workers, respectively. UNITE HERE has also, for the last fifteen years, supported the organizing efforts of graduate student teachers and researchers in the Graduate Employees and Students Organization. Finally, the Federation also includes the 150 dietary workers at Yale New Haven Hospital who are members of Local 1199NE of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). Since 1998, this union has conducted an organizing campaign of about 1,800 other blue-collar service workers at the hospital. On March 22, 2006, the union and hospital agreed to an agreement governing the conduct of both parties in a neutral election process by which hospital employees will be able to vote on whether to unionize.
Graduate student employee unionization, or academic student employee unionization, refers to labor unions that represent students who are employed by their college or university to teach classes, conduct research and perform clerical duties. As of 2014, there were at least 33 US graduate employee unions, 18 unrecognized unions in the United States, and 23 graduate employee unions in Canada. By 2019, it is estimated that there were 83,050 unionized student employees in certified bargaining units in the United States. As of 2023, there were at least 156 US graduate student employee unions and 23 graduate student employee unions in Canada.
The Canadian Union of Public Employees, Local 3902 is a Canadian labour union local representing sessional lecturers, postdoctoral researchers and teaching assistants (TAs) at the University of Toronto, Victoria University in the University of Toronto, the University of St. Michael's College and New College in the University of Toronto.
George W. Taylor was a professor of industrial relations at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, and is credited with founding the academic field of study known as industrial relations. He served in several capacities in the federal government, most notably as a mediator and arbitrator. During his career, Taylor settled more than 2,000 strikes.
The Pennsylvania Association of Staff Nurses and Allied Professionals (PASNAP) is a labor union in Pennsylvania that represents about 8,300 nurses and allied health professionals.
A wildcat strike is a strike action undertaken by unionised workers without union leadership's authorisation, support, or approval; this is sometimes termed an unofficial industrial action. The legality of wildcat strikes varies between countries and over time.
The Graduate Employees' Organization at UIUC (GEO) is a labor union created to defend and extend the bargaining and employment rights of Graduate Employees at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC).
Graduate Employees Together – University of Pennsylvania (GET-UP) is a group of graduate students at the University of Pennsylvania that is trying to become recognized as a union. The group, first formed in the spring of 2001, and affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers (AFT). In 2004, according to exit polling by The Daily Pennsylvanian, the limited set of University of Pennsylvania graduate student employees included in the bargaining unit voted for unionization; however, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), before the votes were counted, decided that graduate students in private universities are not employees, while graduate students in public universities may be employees. The group began to re-form in 2016, and re-affiliated with AFT in October 2016. On March 2, 2017 the group once again decided to go public with their unionization campaign. The group has not been recognized by the University as a union for the purposes of collective bargaining.
The Teaching Assistants Association (TAA) is a graduate student employee union formed at the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1966. It is credited as the first graduate student labor union. Following voluntary recognition by the university as the teaching assistants' bargaining agent in 1969, negotiations resulted in a 1970 strike, which secured "bread-and-butter" gains such as job security alongside grievance procedures. Their major unmet demand from their strike—the inclusion of teaching assistants and students in the course planning process—went unfulfilled. The TAA struck again in 1980 and lost its union recognition until 1986. The union's protest at the Wisconsin State Capitol building began the 2011 Wisconsin protests.
The Harvard Graduate Students Union (HGSU), officially known as Harvard Graduate Students Union United Auto Workers (HGSU-UAW), is a labor union representing graduate students, teaching assistants, and other student employees at Harvard University. The bargaining unit comprises about 5,000 student employees, including graduate students working as research assistants and teaching fellows as well as several hundred undergraduate students holding teaching positions. Contract negotiations with the university are scheduled to begin in Fall 2018. HGSU is affiliated with the United Auto Workers labor union, whose 400,000 members include 45,000 graduate students and 30,000 academic workers.
The 2021–2022 Columbia University strike was a labor strike involving graduate student workers at Columbia University in New York City. The strike began on March 15, 2021, and ended on May 13, 2021. However, additional strike action commenced on November 3 and lasted until January 7, 2022, when a tentative agreement with the university was reached. The strike was organized by the Graduate Workers of Columbia–United Auto Workers Local 2110 (SWC–UAW), a labor union representing student workers at the university. The goals of the strike were an increase in wages, increased healthcare and childcare coverage, and third-party arbitration in cases of discrimination and sexual harassment.
The 1979 Boston University strike was a labor strike involving employees at Boston University, a private university in Boston, Massachusetts, United States. The strike, involving faculty members, clerical workers, and librarians, began on April 5 and was fully ended by April 23.
As of June 2023, over 8,000 workers at over 360 Starbucks stores in at least 40 states in the United States have voted to unionize, primarily with Workers United. As of March 2023 none have yet enacted a collective bargaining agreement. This unionization effort started at a store in Buffalo, New York. About a third of Starbucks' Chilean workforce is already unionized, as well as 450 workers in New Zealand and eight stores in Canada. The longest Starbucks strike lasted 64 days, took place in Brookline, Massachusetts in September 2022 and resulted in the unionization of the employees at that location.
Brenda A. Allen is an American psychologist, educator, and academic administrator who has served as the 14th president of Lincoln University, a historically black university in Oxford, Pennsylvania, since July 2017. She is the second woman to serve as Lincoln University's president after Niara Sudarkasa. Allen has prioritized strengthening Lincoln's academic quality and campus infrastructure.
The 2023 Temple University strike was a labor dispute between the Temple University Graduate Students Association (TUGSA), a graduate student employee union that represented roughly 750 graduate student employees at Temple University, and the university administration, led by President Jason Wingard. The strike began on January 31, 2023, and lasted until March 13, when union members voted to ratify a tentative agreement brokered between the negotiators for both parties.
{{cite web}}: External link in |title=Located in: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania | ||
| Campuses |  | |
| Schools | ||
| Athletics | ||
| People | ||
| Miscellaneous | ||
| ||