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January 2006

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NYU on Strike

By Ari Paul
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January 2006
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T he graduate students at New York University (NYU) made history in 2001 by successfully negotiating a contract between a teachers’ assistants (TA) union  and a private U.S. university. However, going into Thanksgiving break in 2005, the university still refused to negotiate with the union for a second contract. As a result some classes were cancelled while others were moved to off-campus locations. 

The trouble started last year when the National Labor Relations Board reversed a previous decision that said graduate student instructors were workers. The new decision did not bar private universities from recognizing TAs unions, but made it optional. NYU’s contract with the TAs union, a local of the United Auto Workers, then expired last August. 

At NYU, TAs receive stipends in exchange for their teaching services. Before they won their contract, some of them were paying for health insurance out of pocket, says Susan Valentine, a graduate student in medieval history.  

In 2005 the university administration took a hard stance. “In August we proposed a new agreement: recognition of the UAW as the bargaining agent for our graduate students on economic matters (stipends, health care, employment conditions), but not academic matters,” wrote Provost David McLaughlin in a letter to NYU students in October. “We made this proposal to bridge the goals important to the university and the UAW. The union unambiguously rejected the proposal.” 

Andrew Ross, a professor of American Studies and co-chair of the NYU chapter of the American Association of University Professors, says that this is only partially true. Ross, who is also co-founder of the NYU-based group Faculty Democracy, said this offer had two parts that were impossible for any union to live with. First, NYU wanted a contract that would make the workplace an open shop where it would be optional for workers to join the union and pay dues. The union wanted an agency shop where not every worker would be required to join, but all workers would have to pay union dues. The other part, according to Ross, was that the Administration was opposed to having a third party settle dispute—and instead wanted all disputes settled by management. 

Concerning “academic matters,” Valentine says that graduate students are now more invested in these than before. “The big ticket faculty members are drawn here by high salaries and low teaching loads,” said Valentine. “The graduate student TAs make up for it.” 

Author Jennifer Washburn notes this trend in her book, University Inc . “NYU has been on this path of trying to raise its rankings among research institutions,” she said. “That has come at a cost.” More and more of the actual instruction for undergraduates is not done by the big name professor who attracts eager students to the university, but by overworked graduate students who often struggle to make ends meet, in addition to adjunct lecturers. Without union protection, the TAs have no way to ensure that their stipends will compensate them fairly or have a means to voice concerns in the area of teaching. 

“It is steadily paying less attention to the quality and integrity of their undergraduate education,” Washburn said of the school. 

Valentine feels that many undergraduates support the strikers. “Our working conditions are their learning conditions,” she said.  

Ari Paul has written for In These Times, Punk Planet, Time Out Chicago , and many other publications. 
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