Updates

MIT’s administration seeks to exclude over 1,000 graduate workers on fellowship from unionization vote

This January, after MIT’s administration refused to voluntarily recognize the clear majority of graduate workers who signed union cards in support of unionization, they reached out to the MIT Graduate Student Union (MIT-GSU) seeking an agreement on fair terms for a vote on graduate worker unionization. We were hopeful that this meant they were genuinely interested in working with graduate workers to make MIT a more equitable community that represents and responds to the needs of all of its members. Graduate workers representing the MIT-GSU met with MIT’s administrators and lawyers multiple times, and we were able to find common ground on several points about the logistics of an election and the need to hold one this semester, reflecting the urgent need for graduate workers to have a say in our working conditions. However, to our shock, the administration insisted that graduate workers funded by fellowships are not workers and sought to use this artificial distinction to deny over 1,000 graduate workers — approximately 20% of all graduate workers — the right to vote on unionization. Because the administration refused to compromise on this point, we could not reach an agreement, leaving the terms of the election to be set by the National Labor Relations Board in the coming weeks. The administration’s position ignores the fact that graduate workers funded by fellowships do the same vital work as every other MIT graduate worker.

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op-edAdam Trebachlinked
I’m voting yes for the Graduate Student Union because MIT continues to fail its student veterans

Before coming to MIT, I served in the U.S. Army as an infantry soldier. Most of my time in service was spent deployed in Eastern Europe, conducting NATO ally reassurance missions and counter-Russian aggression operations after the annexation of Crimea. Since being accepted to the MIT AeroAstro program in 2019, however, MIT has failed to correctly certify my Veterans Affairs (VA) educational benefits. MIT was noncompliant with federal regulations and unresponsive to my calls to action. These educational benefits are guaranteed in the Post-9/11 GI bill, which provides tuition and housing allowances to veterans who honorably served the country. These benefits enable veterans to gain skills that will help them transition to civilian life through educational and economic support. These benefits have allowed me to begin a new career which is useful and exciting. I joined the MIT Student Veterans Association (SVA) to advocate for the improvement of this situation for all MIT veterans.

Since August 2020, the SVA has highlighted the lack of support for and neglect of the veteran community here at MIT. This has included the lack of a Veteran Support Office, access to coordinated VA healthcare, and data on the identity and number of veterans we have on campus. Even with strong support from the Institute Community and Equity Office and faculty like Professor Amy Glasmeier, the issues brought forth by the SVA are largely ignored or marginalized.


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op-edYadav Gowdalinked
Unionize for a grievance procedure that puts students first

I enjoyed my first nine months in my lab without incident — I got along with my PI and was nearing completion on a body of work that would result in a first-author publication. But one October evening, things changed. My PI sent an email accusing me of breaking equipment that I hadn’t touched in weeks. When I tried to defend myself, she called me “combative” and called my communication style “unprofessional.” She told me that I was a bad lab citizen, even though as lab safety officer I devoted hours every week to managing lab waste and keeping my labmates safe. My PI made several unreasonable demands in the following weeks, including that we work at least 60 hours per week and respond to Slack messages within one hour during the workday, a rule that completely disregards the fact that students have classes and experiments that prohibit swift responses at all times. When I tried to communicate my concerns, I was again accused of “giving pushback” and being disrespectful.

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op-edYadav Gowdalinked
MITGSU-UE files for an NLRB election

Big news: Today we filed thousands of union cards with the National Labor Relations Board to initiate our union election.

We’re excited to kick off the Spring 2022 semester by voting to secure affordable housing, dental insurance, international student protections, fair and clear work expectations, and real decision making power over our working conditions.

MIT graduate student workers account for 65% of the research workforce at the Institute. As the workers closest to our research, we are the experts on what resources we need in the workplace to successfully produce MIT’s world-class innovations and discoveries.

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press releaseYadav Gowda
Improving education at MIT through graduate student unionization

I came to MIT excited for an excellent graduate education in Materials Science and Engineering. After my first few weeks, it became clear to me that much of the work of crafting an education for both graduate and undergraduate students fell to the TAs. They were responsible for attending lectures, drafting problem sets in advance, teaching multiple recitation sessions each week, preparing review sessions, holding office hours, updating and configuring Canvas, drafting exam questions, proctoring exams, and grading problem sets, term papers, and exams. They do all of this while still being expected to conduct world-class research and take on many additional administrative and maintenance tasks.

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op-edYadav Gowdalinked
组建工会, 让我们成为更好的研究者

The following is a translation of our recent Tech op-ed into Mandarin Chinese. Follow MITGSU-UE on WeChat for more updates!


超过 5,000 名研究生驱动着MIT的研究引擎,这约占全校研究人员的 65%[1]。我们精心设计出前所未有的实验,反复尝试直到获得科学严谨的结果,然后汇编撰写文稿,为人类知识体系的积累添砖加瓦。作为直接从事这些研究工作的劳动者,我们自己最清楚我们在工作中需要哪些资源,才能产出 MIT 的各项世界级创新与发现。大多数MIT研究生都签署了工会卡,这是因为我们深信,我们有权利为我们的工作环境发声——而成立工会,从而获得法律保障的雇员谈判能力,是我们能保证自己获得成为杰出研究者所需要的资源的唯一途径。

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op-edYadav Gowda
Empoderándonos Para Ser Mejores Investigadores por Sindicalización

The following is a translation of our recent Tech op-ed into Spanish!

Más de 5,000 trabajadores de posgrado actúan como el motor de investigaciones del MIT, constituyendo aproximadamente 65% del total de investigadores. Nosotros planeamos meticulosamente experimentos que nadie ha hecho en el mundo, los repetimos hasta que los resultados son científicamente correctos y redactamos textos que ultimadamente contribuyen al cuerpo de conocimiento del mundo. Como los trabajadores más cercanos a nuestro trabajo, nosotros somos los expertos en cuanto a los recursos que necesitamos en nuestro lugar de trabajo para producir las innovaciones y los descubrimientos de primera clase del MIT con éxito. La mayoría de los trabajadores de posgrado se han registrado en el sindicato porque nosotros creemos firmemente que merecemos una voz en nuestro lugar de trabajo – y sindicalizarnos es la única manera de garantizarnos el poder de negociar de una forma legalmente viable para obtener las herramientas que necesitamos con el objetivo de ser investigadores sobresalientes.

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op-edYadav Gowda
BGSA votes to endorse MIT GSU

The Black Graduate Student Association (BGSA) is proud to publicly endorse the MIT Graduate Student Union (GSU) through a landslide community vote of 92% in favor.

We acknowledge that the Black student experience at MIT is not monolithic, but nonetheless the vast majority of Black graduate students have gravitated toward the union. There are many reasons for this support, including the fact that with a union, we can use our collective power as graduate workers to win a contract that implements changes the BGSA has advocated for in the past but MIT has failed to address.

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op-edYadav Gowdalinked
Empowering ourselves to be better researchers through unionization

More than 5,000 graduate workers act as MIT’s research engine, accounting for around 65% of the research workforce. We meticulously plan experiments that no one in the world has done before, iterate until the results are scientifically sound, and assemble manuscripts that ultimately contribute to the world’s body of knowledge. As the workers closest to our work, we are the experts on what resources we need in the workplace to successfully produce MIT’s world-class innovations and discoveries. A majority of graduate workers have signed our union cards because we fundamentally believe that we deserve a voice in our workplace — and unionizing is the only way to guarantee us legally-enforceable negotiating power to win the tools that we need to be outstanding researchers.

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op-edYadav Gowdalinked
MIT graduate employees announce majority support for unionization, call on institute to respect democratic will of workers and commit to union negotiations

Today, graduate employees at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) submitted a letter to President Rafael Reif announcing that an overwhelming majority of MIT’s 5,000 graduate employees have signed union authorization cards. Graduate employees work as teaching and research assistants, generating revenue for MIT through intellectual property, grants, teaching undergraduates, and collaborations with private enterprise. They are now requesting that President Reif voluntarily recognize their union and a commitment to establish and protect the working conditions necessary for world class science to flourish by addressing long-standing issues of workplace harassment, housing insecurity, and healthcare access. The MIT Graduate Student Union will be the single largest new private sector union in the country since 2018.

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press releaseYadav Gowda
Letter to President Reif

President L. Rafael Reif,

We, the undersigned representatives of MITGSU-UE, write to inform you that the majority of graduate student workers employed by MIT have signed union authorization cards indicating our desire to be represented by the UE Union for purposes of collective bargaining. We are prepared to demonstrate majority support by submitting these cards to a mutually-agreeable neutral third party for verification.

In signing these cards we are, as the MIT administration’s website states, “allowing the union to act as our exclusive representative for purposes of negotiating the terms and conditions of our roles.” This union of graduate student workers, empowered by the democratically expressed will of our members, requests that you voluntarily recognize us, meet us at the bargaining table, and begin the important work of improving the state of both science and scientists at MIT.

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press releaseYadav Gowda
Student Veterans Battle for GI Bill Benefits at MIT, Another School Fighting the VA

From military.com:

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology, or MIT, lost GI Bill eligibility for one of its programs and never sought approval for doctoral courses due to a series of paperwork snafus and poor communication with state approving authorities, leaving some veterans at the school in limbo and out thousands of dollars, an investigation by Military.com found.

There are 104 GI Bill beneficiaries on MIT's campus, worth some $3 million in tuition to the university. At least 20 were impacted by huge delays in benefits that include tuition and up to $3,000 per month in housing allowances.

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other mediaYadav Gowdalinked
International student workers deserve fair treatment

In June 2019, President Rafael Reif wrote to the MIT community that immigration and international exchange are the “oxygen” of innovation and prosperity, appearing to express a commitment from MIT to support international student workers. However, the following year, MIT threw hundreds of international students into crisis by suddenly ending remote appointments that had enabled them to work from their home countries during the pandemic. This was not an isolated event, but rather an intensification of a pattern of precarity and disempowerment that international student workers frequently experience. During this crisis and in the months since, we’ve spoken to many fellow international student workers who believe that MIT’s policies often do not reflect or respond to our needs and that forming a graduate student worker union at MIT is the best way we can compel the Institute to respect our rights and well-being. Here are some of the stories we have heard.

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op-edYadav Gowdalinked
Graduate student-leaders: only a union can secure real change at MIT

As graduate student-advocates, we know the needs of our community and the harm that happens when student voices are not part of the conversation. We know that graduate student-workers need stronger protections against harassment and discrimination, robust investment in diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs, affordable housing, and a living wage. To this end, we joined committees, councils, task forces, and advisory boards, determined to positively impact the experience of MIT graduate workers. Instead of making progress, we witnessed the MIT administration unilaterally ignore inconvenient recommendations, dismiss and exploit the service of graduate student-workers, and resist the changes we urgently need.

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op-edYadav Gowdalinked
The MIT GSU and UE will bring a history of social justice to the future of MIT

Since the MIT graduate student unionization campaign began Sept. 27, the strength of our collective voice has grown. Worker after worker after worker has come forward with issues impacting their research and student life at MIT, and a majority of graduate workers have already signed their union cards in support of unionization. Through thousands of conversations with our fellow graduate workers, we’ve highlighted student issues like affordable housing, COVID relief policies, and funding and compensation. In the wake of the resounding endorsement of the MIT Graduate Student Union (GSU) by MIT’s Black Graduate Student Association (BGSA), the MIT GSU wants to highlight our prioritization of one of the most-voiced graduate worker demands at MIT: a material, institutional commitment to racial and social justice.

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op-edYadav Gowdalinked
A $6,000 bill and inadequate coverage: How MIT health insurance fails graduate workers

All MIT graduate workers know that the cost of living in the Boston/Cambridge area is exorbitant. Now, imagine being hit with a surprise $6,000 medical bill — this is the nightmarish reality for some graduate workers at MIT.

Despite MIT’s extreme wealth, many of its graduate workers with chronic health needs do not receive affordable care with the currently-offered student insurance; moreover, relief funds meant to help with unexpected medical costs are poorly publicized and can be denied on arbitrary technicalities to the graduate workers who need them most. To secure comprehensive healthcare coverage and to make sure that every graduate worker can afford to receive the healthcare they need, we must come together to form a union.

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op-edYadav Gowdalinked
Graduate Students Form Union, MIT Offers Unprecedented Mid-Year Raise

This morning, MIT announced the first ever mid-year pay raise for graduate student-workers. This comes 106 days after MIT's fiscal year ended with the endowment growing by $9 billion, and 17 days after nearly 1000 graduate-workers rallied in Hockfield Court to announce the formation of the MIT Graduate Student Union (MIT GSU). We knew that a union would deliver better conditions for graduate workers, but even we are surprised to see it happen so soon!

Make no mistake, this pay increase is happening because thousands of graduate workers are standing together, signing union cards, and demanding better working conditions at MIT. Join us and sign your union card today.

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press releaseYadav Gowda