Strike Warning #13

October 31, 2011 by Leave a comment

Strike Warning #13
October 31, 2011

Number of days without a contract: 488
Last bargaining session with the SIUC administration: October 28, 2011
Next bargaining session with the SIUC administration: October 31, 2011

Fellow graduate assistants,

GAU has added a strike-specific FAQ to our website for international graduate assistants: http://wp.me/P15BvZ-9i.

The main information we want you to be aware of is that your visa WILL NOT be effected should you choose to strike. Any graduate assistant engaging in legal strike actions will not have their assistantship status changed! A striking employee is still considered an employee. The university has threatened this in previous communications simply to scare you out of exercising your legal rights to strike. There is nothing to be afraid of when we stand together.

Your GAU bargaining team did have sessions with the administration on both Thursday and Friday. We have managed to come close to agreements on most of our minor issues. However, we have made little or no progress on the issues most important to us: fees, stipend, or health care. The university is going to make us fight for every inch of movement on those three issues — all of which affect our livelihoods and take money out of our pockets. GAU is still fighting for fee payments by the university, more comprehensive health benefits including a written commitment to following the Affordable Care Act, and a stipend raise that keeps pace with the increasing cost of living.

But we need your help to do that. We need as many people as possible to participate in pre-strike activities and, should a strike become necessary, be on the picket lines demanding the university do better. You don’t have to be a member to participate in a strike though joining GAU now sends a strong signal to the university that GAs are tired of paying more and more every year in fees and being offered inadequate health insurance! If you are interested in joining or helping, contact us as soon as possible!

Communications will be more frequent as we countdown the days until the strike deadline.
You can stay informed by reading our webpage (http://gaunited.org), joining our Facebook group (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=6789631853&ref=ts), following our brand new Twitter feed (http://twitter.com/#!/SIUCGAUnited), or subscribing to the blog for all four IEA-NEA unions on campus (http://siucunions.wordpress.com).

In solidarity,
Kristi Brownfield
Vice-President for Communications

Filed under bargaining, strike, strike watch

Strike Warning #12

October 27, 2011 by Leave a comment

Strike Warning #12
October 27, 2011

Number of days without a contract: 484
Last bargaining session with the SIUC administration: October 21, 2011
Next bargaining session with the SIUC administration: October 27, 2011

Fellow graduate assistants,

GAU will be bargaining both today and tomorrow with the administration. We are still doing our best to secure a fair contract that works for graduate assistants in dealing with fees and health care. Our intention is to continue bargaining to try and reach a tentative agreement so graduate assistants don’t have to strike.

But please realize we have significantly more power standing together than your bargaining team has sitting alone at the table. We may have to act together by going on strike to get our legitimate needs addressed.

GAU is hosting an informational meeting TONIGHT in the Student Center Ballroom A from 5-6pm for international students. This is a great time to come talk to us about your concerns and get the real facts about striking.

We, along with the Association of Civil Service Employees, the Faculty Association, and the Non-Tenure Track Association, are hosting an open house at our new strike headquarters tomorrow from 4:30-6:30pm, with a brief presentation by each union about the bargaining situation at 5:00pm. This is where you’ll be able to get the most up-to-date information about bargaining! Food and drink will be provided. The strike headquarters are located in the old Carbondale High School on the corner of Oakland and High Street. You can find a map of its location here: http://wp.me/p1vXJd-en

Finally, GAU has been communicating with the administration about statements made in The Southern and their threatening FAQ. You can read our lawyer’s analysis of their illegal actions on our website here: http://wp.me/p15BvZ-92 Our communication with the administration telling them to cease and desist is available here: http://wp.me/p15BvZ-96

Communications will be more frequent as we countdown the ten days until the strike deadline.
You can stay informed by reading our webpage (http://gaunited.org), joining our Facebook group (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=6789631853&ref=ts), following our brand new Twitter feed (http://twitter.com/#!/SIUCGAUnited), or subscribing to the blog for all four IEA-NEA unions on campus (http://siucunions.wordpress.com).

In solidarity,
Kristi Brownfield
Vice-President for Communications

Filed under bargaining, events, strike

Communication About the Threatening Statements

October 26, 2011 by Leave a comment

Jim Clark, acting on our behalf, sent this communication to the dean of the graduate school, David Wilson, about statements made in the Southern about our tuition scholarships and other aspects of graduate assistant working conditions and pay:

 

Dean Wilson:

 Prior to the October 21, 2011 bargaining session I asked the Graduate School staff if a Graduate Assistant Handbook still existed as part of the Graduate School policies.  At the October 21 session I asked you if you had such a document and you presented the GAU Bargaining Team with a copy of the 2007-2010 Agreement between the Board of Trustees of Southern Illinois University and the GAU.  You said the collective bargaining contract is the policy.

In the Southern Illinoisan online article of October 26 (copy attached) SIU spokesperson Rod Sievers makes a threat to punish Assistants who do not work 13 weeks.  He also threatens to require GA repayment to the university for the employer share of student-fee paid health coverage [assistants have already paid in full the primary care fee] if an assistant exercises his/her right to strike. Participating in a legal action is not a break in employment negating insurance benefits or payments as asserted by Mr. Sievers.

The statements of Mr. Sievers are not express provisions of the Collective Bargaining Agreement and are inappropriate and misleading.

On behalf of GAU, I ask that you and SIU Legal Counsel take immediate steps to require Mr. Sievers to publicly retract his October 26 statements as erroneous and misleading.  In addition, I am also informing you under advice of IEA Legal Counsel that the Chancellor’s recent FAQ to graduate assistants must also be retracted since it contains illegal threats of punishment and retaliation designed to chill graduate assistants in the exercise of their legal right to strike under the Illinois Educational Labor Relation Act.

Please provide me and GAU President, Jim Podesva with proof of compliance within 24 hours of receipt of this communication.

James F. Clark
Uniserv Director
Illinois Education Association-NEA
500 E. Plaza Drive
Suite 5
Carterville, Illinois 62918
Tele:  618-733-4472 (Work)
800-431-3730 (Toll Free)
Fax:    618-733-4481

We will keep you updated on the administrative response.

 

Filed under bargaining, events, news, strike

IEA Legal Analysis of Chancellor Cheng’s FAQ

October 25, 2011 by Leave a comment

As you all know, the Chancellor sent out a FAQ a few weeks ago that GAU strongly disagreed with. I wanted to share with you the legal analysis from our IEA lawyer on this FAQ and the threats made within:

                                                IEA Legal Analysis of Chancellor Cheng’s FAQ

“Under the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Act (115 ILCS 5/1 et seq.) (“Act”), Graduate Assistants (“GA’s”) are legally entitled to strike.  In fact, Section 3 affords GAs the right to “organize, form, join, or assist in employee organizations or engage in lawful concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid and protection or bargain collectively through representatives of their own free choice …[and] have the right to refrain from any or all such activities.” 

According to the Act, SIUC would be guilty of an “unfair labor practice” for “interfering, restraining or coercing employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed under this Act.”  SIUC would also be guilty of an unfair labor practice for “discriminating in regard to hire or tenure or employment or any term or condition of employment to encourage or discourage membership in any employee organization.

With this legal backdrop, it is our belief that SIUC is in violation of the Labor Act when it:

  • Threatened GA s that they were “[choosing] between participating in a strike or continuing [their] work/education.”
  • As the University is aware, under the Act, GA’s have the legal right to strike without losing their employment or adversely affecting their student status.
  • Threatened GA s that there were “consequences and risks that they will experience if they individually choose to strike.”
  • As the University is well aware, under the Act, GA’s cannot be subject to “consequences and risks” affecting their employment or student status for engaging in a strike.
  • Threatened all faculty with reprisals for engaging in a strike that results in the cancellation of classes.
  • As the University is aware that under the Act, accusing faculty of cancelling classes and threatening to discipline those same faculty members simply because they voted to strike, is an illegal restraint on the faculty members’ Section 3 rights as stated above.
  • Threatened GA s by stating, “Graduate Assistants who go on strike, rather than work, put at risk their eligibility for a waiver of tuition and partial payment of their Health Service fee, which may make them fully responsible for payment of tuition and fees.”
  • Again, the University is well aware that, under the Act it cannot threaten, much less take putative action against GA s in the form of tuition waivers and/or Health Service fees simply because they engaged in a labor strike.
  • Threatened that GAs who struck would not receive any of their compensation, including stipend, tuition or other forms of compensation.
  • The University knows that you have the legal right to strike.  It knows that a strike can shift the power balance to you.  It has chosen to engage in scare campaign instead of putting their resources into a fair contract.

The University’s threat is illegal, as would its action to enforce the threat.”

Filed under news, strike

Strike Warning #11: STRIKE DATE SET FOR NOVEMBER 3

October 24, 2011 by Leave a comment

Strike Warning #11: STRIKE DATE SET FOR NOVEMBER 3, 2011
October 24, 2011

Number of days without a contract: 481
Last bargaining session with the SIUC administration: October 21, 2011
Next bargaining session with the SIUC administration: October 27, 2011

Fellow graduate assistants,

Three weeks ago, we voted to authorize a strike if no significant progress has been made at the bargaining table on the things that take money out of our pockets: high fees, a stipend that isn’t keeping pace with the cost of living, being forced to take and pay for classes we don’t need under the 8-credit hour rule, and health care that forces us to pay for any real help.

Three weeks later, the administration’s offer remains the same:

1 percent stipend increase beginning January 1, 2012
1 percent stipend increase for FY 2013
2 percent stipend increase for FY 2014
No new fee freeze or payment of fees by the administration
No contractual obligation to follow the guidelines of the Affordable Health Care Act

This is a plan that amounts to about a $15 a month stipend increase for this year and next year and about $25 a month in 2014. That doesn’t sound like much — especially when you realize there is no protection or help when dealing with current or future fees.

This is a plan that continues to take money from your pocket.

GAU membership voting to authorize a strike put pressure on the administration to do better. They haven’t. We need to increase that pressure to reach a fair contract but if we can’t get a deal that keeps our money where it belongs we will have to use our last option: a strike.

The GAU bargaining team has given the following resolution:

The Graduate Assistants United (GAU) bargaining team resolves that GAU set a strike date for 12:01 a.m., November 3, 2011 unless a tentative agreement is recommended by the GAU bargaining team before that time. The strike ends when the GAU bargaining Team recommends a tentative agreement or the membership of GAU votes to end the strike.

The Faculty Association, the Association for Civil Service Employees, and the Non-Tenure Track Faculty Association have also set November 3rd as their strike date. We are not alone. Standing together we have the power to protect ourselves and gain a good contract.

Our contract is the policy for GAs; it protects our appointments, it covers our salaries, it covers our hours of work. The contract is our way of having control and power over our working conditions.

Our contract is our shared governance. Now is the time to exercise our voices and tell the administration we want something better.

You can contact the Board of Trustees, President Glenn Poshard, and Chancellor Rita Cheng directly to deliver that message:

Ms. Misty Whittington
Executive Secretary of the Board
Office of the Southern Illinois University Board of Trustees
(618) 536-3357

Rita Cheng: rcheng@siu.edu
SIUC Chancellor
(618) 453-2341

Glenn Poshard: poshard@siu.edu
SIU President
(618) 536-3357

GAU will also be having an open meeting for international graduate assistants Thursday October 27, from 5-6pm in the Student Center Ballroom A. Please join us and get informed, share your concerns, and tell us what’s going on in your departments.

Communications will be more frequent as we countdown the ten days until the strike deadline.
You can stay informed by reading our webpage (http://gaunited.org), joining our Facebook group (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=6789631853&ref=ts), following our brand new Twitter feed (http://twitter.com/#!/SIUCGAUnited), or subscribing to the blog for all four IEA-NEA unions on campus (http://siucunions.wordpress.com).

In solidarity,
Kristi Brownfield
Vice-President for Communications

Filed under strike, strike watch

Strike Warning #10

October 21, 2011 by 2 Comments

Strike Warning #10
October 21, 2011

Number of days without a contract: 478
Last bargaining session with the SIUC administration: October 21, 2011
Next bargaining session with the SIUC administration: October 27, 2011

We did meet with the administration’s bargaining team this afternoon and discussed the proposal we gave them. Our proposal does include language for all open issues still on the table. Our proposal to the administration is available here in PDF format. This proposal covers a contract period that lasts from July 1, 2010 – June 30, 2014. Black text is language from our existing contract. Black underlined text is language that has been changed at the bargaining table and has received verbal agreements from both sides. Blue text is our language in this proposal.

If you are interested in hearing about the administration’s response to this proposal, I urge you to come to our upcoming meeting this Monday October 24th from 6-7pm in the Student Center Ballroom C. We will be giving a more comprehensive bargaining update and discussing a strike date.

GAU will also be doing some phone banking this weekend as part of our strike assessment. We need volunteers; we need your help. If you have a spare half hour, we’d love to see you there. We’ll be meeting behind Blimpie’s in the Student Center from 12pm-3pm both Saturday and Sunday and we hope you’ll join us.

I want you to remember our goal here is to get a fair contract we can live with. A strike is a tool we may have to use to get that contract — even though we all hope we don’t have to. However, given the situation at our bargaining table, we have to be prepared for that possibility. The Faculty Association, the Association of Civil Service Employees, and the Non-Tenure Track Faculty Association and have already set their strike date as November 3rd. A successful strike will mean we get what we really want — a good contract that deals with our legitimate concerns around fees and health care. To have a successful strike, we have stand together — work together — to demand the respect we deserve as employees. We — all of us together — can do this. There is nothing to be scared of when you stand together — and that’s what a union is, people standing together and standing up for their rights.

You can stay informed by reading our webpage (http://gaunited.org), joining our Facebook group (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=6789631853&ref=ts), following our brand new Twitter feed (http://twitter.com/#!/SIUCGAUnited), or subscribing to the blog for all four IEA-NEA unions on campus (http://siucunions.wordpress.com).

A “strike warning” means conditions are favorable for a strike for GAU and our sister unions, the Association of Civil Service Employees, the Faculty Association, and the Non-Tenure Track Faculty Association. The administration can solve this crisis today by settling our contracts. Make your voice heard by joining GAU!

In solidarity,
Kristi Brownfield
Vice-President for Communications

Filed under bargaining, strike watch

Strike Warning #9

October 20, 2011 by 2 Comments

Strike Warning #9
October 20, 2011

Number of days without a contract: 477
Last bargaining session with the SIUC administration: October 14, 2011
Next bargaining session with the SIUC administration: October 21, 2011

Fellow graduate assistants,

Your GAU bargaining team is presenting a contract proposal to the administration’s team which deals with all of our open issues. We will be sharing that proposal with you as well to give you a better idea of the exact language we are trying to achieve after it has been given to the Board team.

I will be releasing the text of the proposal on our website as soon as it is available.

You can expect another update on Friday following our bargaining session. I will make sure to include the administration’s response to our proposal.

GAU is holding an open membership meeting on Monday October 24 from 6-7pm, in Ballroom C of the Student Center. We urge you to be there! At this meeting we will briefly go over the proposal and give a bargaining update and then move onto a discussion of setting a strike date.

If we want to gain everything in this proposal we are going to have to continue to maintain — and increase — the pressure we are putting on the administration. We gained movement after voting to authorize a strike and the best way to increase that pressure is to put a deadline on bargaining: a strike date.

You can stay informed by reading our webpage (http://gaunited.org), joining our Facebook group (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=6789631853&ref=ts), following our brand new Twitter feed (http://twitter.com/#!/SIUCGAUnited), or subscribing to the blog for all four IEA-NEA unions on campus (http://siucunions.wordpress.com).

A “strike warning” means conditions are favorable for a strike for GAU and our sister unions, the Association of Civil Service Employees, the Faculty Association, and the Non-Tenure Track Faculty Association. The administration can solve this crisis today by settling our contracts. Make your voice heard by joining GAU!

In solidarity,
Kristi Brownfield
Vice-President for Communications

Filed under bargaining, events

Strike Warning #8: Bargaining Update

October 14, 2011 by 1 Comment

Strike Warning #8
October 14, 2011

Number of days without a contract: 470
Last bargaining session with the SIUC administration: October 14, 2011
Next bargaining session with the SIUC administration: October 21, 2011

Fellow graduate assistants,

I wish to thank everyone who showed up outside of Anthony Hall today during our bargaining session. Your bargaining team heard the cries of “What do we want? A contract!” and “Settle!” The administration’s bargaining team certainly did as well. That pressure we all have been putting on the administration has finally got us to the point where we are having real conversations about our issues surrounding fees, stipends, and health care. We need to keep the pressure up to get what we want: a fair contract!

Today’s bargaining brought one gain we have been pushing for since 2010: the university administration now seems willing to make a commitment to follow the guidelines of the Patient Affordable Care Act.

This change comes from your hard work: your letters to the editor, calling the administration, calling the board, showing up for rallies, and everything else you have done up to this point.

But GAU needs to ask you to keep doing that — and more! We still have not heard any sort of concessions to changing and improving our health care benefit, freezing fees, or a change on their previous economic offer.

Your GAU bargaining team is putting together a comprehensive economic proposal we plan on delivering to the administration’s team at our next session. Once this proposal has been presented to their team, we will make the text publicly available on our website.

We are also going to be organizing another open meeting coming shortly to discuss this proposal, what it might mean to you, and what you can do to ensure we get it — including a strike and strike dates. More information on this meeting will be coming soon!

You can stay informed by reading our webpage (http://gaunited.org), joining our Facebook group (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=6789631853&ref=ts), following our brand new Twitter feed (http://twitter.com/#!/SIUCGAUnited), or subscribing to the blog for all four IEA-NEA unions on campus (http://siucunions.wordpress.com).

A “strike warning” means conditions are favorable for a strike for GAU and our sister unions, the Association of Civil Service Employees, the Faculty Association, and the Non-Tenure Track Faculty Association. The administration can solve this crisis today by settling our contracts. Make your voice heard by joining GAU!

In solidarity,
Kristi Brownfield
Vice-President for Communications

Filed under bargaining, strike watch

Strike Warning #7

October 10, 2011 by Leave a comment

Strike Warning #7
October 10, 2011

Number of days without a contract: 466
Last bargaining session with the SIUC administration: September 30, 2011
Next bargaining session with the SIUC administration: October 14, 2011

Fellow graduate assistants,

GAU leadership is getting ready for our next bargaining session on Friday. Our goals remain the same: a fee freeze or a stipend increase that compensates for current and future fees and health care change that begins with a university commitment to follow the Affordable Health Care Act.

Given the amount of communication coming from the Chancellor’s office in the past week, we can safely say the four successful strike authorizations votes are having an effect — in public. We have yet to see if there will be a substantive effect at the bargaining table. However, despite the intimidation and scare-tactics within those university communications, your GAU bargaining team has found something to be hopeful about:

“Any conversation about enhanced healthcare benefits and related costs must be considered in the context of compliance with federal health care reform (ACA) and affordability for all of our students.” (from Friday October 7)

Given that one of our goals is “university compliance with federal health care reform,” we believe this communication may be the first sign the university’s bargaining position of “no” is changing.

We will find out if there is any follow-through on Friday. I will provide a bargaining update Friday afternoon when our bargaining session concludes.

But please remember, this public statement – one of the first the Chancellor has ever made about graduate assistants, only came AFTER we voted to authorize a strike. The administration is feeling the effects of our pressure on them. We need to keep that pressure up!

There will a student organized solidarity action on Wednesday October 12 in front of Anthony Hall at 4:30

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=256763871032702

We are also asking for your help in setting up department meetings! If GAU has not visited your department yet, or if we have and you’d like to come back and talk some more, please contact us!

You can stay informed by reading our webpage (http://gaunited.org), joining our Facebook group (http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=6789631853&ref=ts), following our brand new Twitter feed (http://twitter.com/#!/SIUCGAUnited), or subscribing to the blog for all four IEA-NEA unions on campus (http://siucunions.wordpress.com).

A “strike warning” means conditions are favorable for a strike for GAU and our sister unions, the Association of Civil Service Employees, the Faculty Association, and the Non-Tenure Track Faculty Association. The administration can solve this crisis today by settling our contracts. Make your voice heard by joining GAU!

In solidarity,
Kristi Brownfield
Vice-President for Communications

Filed under bargaining, events, strike watch

The Bad and the Good

October 7, 2011 by Leave a comment

Re the Chancellor’s email:

After the usual fear-mongering, there’s something interesting at the end:

“Health coverage is an issue in which all of our students – 16,000 undergraduate and 4,000 graduates – have a stake. The Administration is committed to ensuring that our students have quality health coverage at competitive rates and is willing to explore with our student governance leaders and the GAU, benefit alternatives along with appropriate comparisons of premium, cost and benefits. Any conversation about enhanced healthcare benefits and related costs must be considered in the context of compliance with federal health care reform (ACA) and affordability for all of our students.”

That’s carefully non-committal language in the email, but could it perhaps be evidence of a slight movement in the administration’s position? We’ll see next Friday if Cheng & Co. really are committed to decent health-care for Graduate Assistants, or if it is just lip-service. Keep the pressure up, they have to respond.

Filed under health care, Uncategorized

← Older posts

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.