Graduate Employees and Students Organization
Encyclopedia
Trade union
A trade union, trades union or labor union is an organization of workers that have banded together to achieve common goals such as better working conditions. The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members and negotiates labour contracts with...
at Yale University
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
in New Haven
New Haven, Connecticut
New Haven is the second-largest city in Connecticut and the sixth-largest in New England. According to the 2010 Census, New Haven's population increased by 5.0% between 2000 and 2010, a rate higher than that of the State of Connecticut, and higher than that of the state's five largest cities, and...
, Connecticut
Connecticut
Connecticut is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and the state of New York to the west and the south .Connecticut is named for the Connecticut River, the major U.S. river that approximately...
.
The group's precursor, T.A. Solidarity, was founded in 1987. T.A. Solidarity members voted to affiliate with other campus unions in the Spring of 1990, seeking union recognition and collective bargaining
Collective bargaining
Collective bargaining is a process of negotiations between employers and the representatives of a unit of employees aimed at reaching agreements that regulate working conditions...
, and adopting their current nomenclature. GESO members have participated in several strikes and walk-outs over the course of their sixteen-year history. In March, 2003, GESO members joined members of campus unions in a one week strike, in an attempt to gain recognition as a collective bargaining agent from the Yale University administration.
In April 2003, GESO held a voluntary, not legally binding, but highly controversial election under the supervision of the League of Women Voters
League of Women Voters
The League of Women Voters is an American political organization founded in 1920 by Carrie Chapman Catt during the last meeting of the National American Woman Suffrage Association approximately six months before the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution gave women the right to vote...
, in which graduate students voted 694 to 651 against making GESO their collective bargaining agent. This is despite the fact that GESO selected its own list of voters, excluding those TAs who they deemed to be unfit for the election, and focused on publicizing the election in departments where they had the most support (such as humanities and languages). Observers attributed the loss to the aggressive and undemocratic tactics of GESO recruiters, such as disrupting psychological lab experiments and forcing their way into biological labs where radioactive experiments were being run.
GESO later attributed the loss to an unexpectedly high number of science students turning out to vote. There is also evidence that a number of members did vote against their union in the ballot. There were also 27 write in ballots which stated that they supported the idea of unionization, but did not support GESO as that union.http://www.yaledailynews.com/Article.aspx?ArticleID=22877
In December 2005, GESO finally won a victory in their own elections, after denying the right to vote to any student who opposes unionization, and excluding all TAs from the natural sciences altogether. When asked why all of the TAs from the natural sciences were excluded, GESO publicity contact Rachel Sulkes said that they have "defined themselves as outside our interests".
GESO has since mounted campaigns over pay equity in the humanities and alleged human rights violations in the university's investment policies, while continuing to push for union recognition.
Actions
Several hundred graduate students from humanities and social sciences at Yale and ColumbiaColumbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
universities went on a teaching strike for five days in April 2005 to demand recognition from their universities less than a year after the National Labor Relations Board
National Labor Relations Board
The National Labor Relations Board is an independent agency of the United States government charged with conducting elections for labor union representation and with investigating and remedying unfair labor practices. Unfair labor practices may involve union-related situations or instances of...
denied them of protections under the National Labor Relations Act
National Labor Relations Act
The National Labor Relations Act or Wagner Act , is a 1935 United States federal law that limits the means with which employers may react to workers in the private sector who create labor unions , engage in collective bargaining, and take part in strikes and other forms of concerted activity in...
, reversing an earlier precedent, decided in 2000, that graduate employees at New York University
New York University
New York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...
were workers and thus entitled to said protections. University officials have stated that the strike had "minimal impact" on the operations of the school. Jesse Jackson
Jesse Jackson
Jesse Louis Jackson, Sr. is an African-American civil rights activist and Baptist minister. He was a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1984 and 1988 and served as shadow senator for the District of Columbia from 1991 to 1997. He was the founder of both entities that merged to...
made a brief appearance on behalf of GESO. http://www.yaledailynews.com/article.asp?AID=29381 The university has stated that it will continue its previous policy and will not bargain with GESO. http://www.yaledailynews.com/article.asp?AID=29423
GESO is affiliated with UNITE HERE
UNITE HERE
UNITE HERE is a labor union in the United States and Canada with more than 265,000 active members The union's members work predominantly in the hotel, food service, laundry, warehouse, and casino gaming industries...
as a constituent member of the Federation of Hospital and University Employees
Federation of Hospital and University Employees
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...
, which also includes food service and maintenance workers, clerical and technical workers, and employees of Yale-New Haven Hospital
Yale-New Haven Hospital
Yale-New Haven Hospital , Connecticut's largest hospital with 966 beds, is located in New Haven, Connecticut.The hospital is owned and operated by the Yale New Haven Health System, Inc...
's dietary unit.
GSA Neutrality
The Graduate Student Assembly (GSA), the university's official representative body for graduate students (which has advisory capacities in some matters, voting capacities in others), has decided to remain neutral to the union debate, and has issued a statement of neutrality to that effect.Opposition
Groups have been formed in opposition to the union. These include Graduates Against Student Organization GASO, an unorganized collection of students in direct opposition of GESO, and At What Cost?At What Cost?
At What Cost? is a name that has been used by a handful of unrelated graduate student groups who opposed specific graduate student unionization drives at each of their universities...
, which encourages careful consideration of the consequences of forming a graduate student union. Both groups criticize GESO for their "aggressive recruiting methods." Also, these organzitions argue that a sizable number of graduate students who are counted by GESO as members signed member cards solely to pacify recruiters. Membership in both groups is low, and their activity has been primarily in response to GESO actions, such as the 2003 election.
See also
- Graduate student unionizationGraduate student unionizationGraduate 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 2007 there are 28 graduate student employee local unions in the United States. and 21 local...
- Graduate Student Organizing CommitteeGraduate Student Organizing CommitteeThe Graduate Student Organizing Committee is a labor union representing graduate teaching and research assistants at New York University ....
- National Labor Relations ActNational Labor Relations ActThe National Labor Relations Act or Wagner Act , is a 1935 United States federal law that limits the means with which employers may react to workers in the private sector who create labor unions , engage in collective bargaining, and take part in strikes and other forms of concerted activity in...
- NLRB election proceduresNLRB election proceduresThe National Labor Relations Board, an agency within the United States government, was created in 1935 as part of the National Labor Relations Act. Among the NLRB’s chief responsibilities is the holding of elections to permit employees to vote whether they wish to be represented by a particular...