University of Pennsylvania Graduate Employees File Petition to Form Union with AFT

PHILADELPHIA—Today, a strong majority of graduate employees at the University of Pennsylvania filed a petition with the National Labor Relations Board to hold a formal union recognition election. Members of Graduate Employees Together—University of Pennsylvania visited the Philadelphia NLRB office to deliver official authorization cards signed by grad workers from seven schools.

A board-supervised election for union recognition is expected soon, barring a decision by the university to litigate established precedent, with more than 2,300 workers eligible to vote. In March, GET-UP members went public with their campaign to win a seat at the bargaining table to address funding insecurity, healthcare costs, family leave, vision and dental care, and inadequate mental health resources.

Miranda Weinberg, a sixth-year doctoral candidate in education and anthropology, said: “We’re unionizing in order to gain a real voice in determining our working conditions. Graduate workers do important work at the university as teachers and researchers, and deserve to be treated with respect. Forming a union will allow us to do a better job of advancing our goals and those of the university: achieving excellence in research and teaching.”

Olivia Harding, a first-year doctoral student in cell and molecular biology, said: “We want a union because we want to be recognized as a body of workers that does valuable labor for the University of Pennsylvania, and because we want to build a community around the conscientious vision that we share. We deserve a voice at the table with our employer so that we can all have a say in our working conditions. In our particular position as graduate employees, we feel that because Penn is a powerful institution, our union can have a strong, democratically guided influence on the future of academia.”

AFT Pennsylvania President Ted Kirsch said: “Grad workers come to Penn to do what they love; their teaching and research work is integral to the success of the university. A union contract means that they can focus on their jobs and address the issues they face at work. By building a collective voice, grads will make the university a healthier, more sustainable and democratic institution.”

AFT President Randi Weingarten said: “Grad employees started GET-UP because they recognized that they deserve a real say over the work they do, and the AFT wants to help them secure that voice. They teach the classes and undertake the research that make the University of Pennsylvania run, and their vision of a university workplace rooted in both democracy and excellence is one shared by their academic peers across the country. Together, the Penn grad workers will win the right to negotiate as partners with the administration to build an even better university.”

Last year, the National Labor Relations Board formally classified private colleges’ graduate teaching and research assistants as workers. The AFT is also affiliated with graduate unions organizing at Princeton University, the University of Chicago, Brown University, Northwestern University and Cornell University.

The largest U.S. higher education union, the AFT already represents more than 25,000 graduate employee members across 23 institutions in nine states.