SUPPORT OF TEMPLE UNIVERSITY GRADUATE EMPLOYEES

WHEREAS, Temple University's 1,100 graduate employees perform vital professional service to the university in education and research-teaching, for example, more than half of the contact hours in the core curriculum; and

WHEREAS, Temple University's graduate employees have formed a union, the Temple University Graduate Students' Association, affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers; and

WHEREAS, a majority of the university's graduate employees have demonstrated their support of the union by becoming members and petitioning for the conduct of a collective bargaining election; and

WHEREAS, despite this clear mandate, the university has been mounting a legal challenge to the graduate employees' right to organize and has been successful in forestalling a collective bargaining election while legal appeals continue; and

WHEREAS, it is within the university administration's authority to voluntarily support a bargaining election and to recognize the union; and

WHEREAS, Temple University administration bargains in good faith with the Temple Association of University Professionals, representing the faculty and professional staff, as well as other unions on campus; and

WHEREAS, graduate employees and university administrations across America have instituted collective bargaining at their institutions:

RESOLVED, that the American Federation of Teachers stand in solidarity with Temple University's graduate employees and firmly support their right to collective bargaining;

RESOLVED, that the American Federation of Teachers strongly condemn the University's opposition to its graduate employees' right to organize;

RESOLVED, that the American Federation of Teachers call upon the Temple University board of trustees to lift its legal challenge, acknowledge the fundamental fairness of permitting graduate employees to choose collective bargaining, and allow for an open, independently monitored collective bargaining election among the graduate employees.