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11/30 General Body Meeting - Cypress and Grove 6pm-8pm
-> food, drinks, solidarity! -> voting on budget and several officer positions 12/01 BARGAINING - Reitz Union 9:15am-11:30am -> Healthcare and Housing! Come show support! ->Reitz Union Room 3320 or ZOOM meeting, debrief 11/20 Monday - no events 11/21 Tuesday - Tabling at Reitz Union 11am-2pm 11/22 Wednesday - no events 11/23-11/24 - BREAK NO EVENTS
Committee Help Needed Our Healthcare and International committees need your help! We want our members to share their ideas! Do you have thoughts on GatorGradCare? Please join our Healthcare Committee by emailing chair Nathan Ardnt, [email protected]. Have concerns about issues affecting international students? Join our international committee by getting on our discord! Bargaining Updates In the bargaining session last Friday, Nov 17th, our bargaining committee discussed Article 11 which addresses the tuition program. Our proposal to allow all GAs to request extra credit hours for their tuition waiver (up to 12 in spring and 6 in summer). The proposal would also allow for TAs on 9 month contracts to request a tuition waiver for credits over the summer. GAU is now ready to “tentatively agree” to the changes. This means that union members will eventually vote on these changes and with approval they will be sent to the board of trustees for ratification. We also presented a proposal for Article 21 which covers discipline with the goal of strengthening the protections regarding disciplinary policy and action, especially in light of the stipulation placed into the merit raise we recently voted on. GAU constructed a proposal with clearer specification of disciplinary policy and action. The notice of discipline will also be more specifically defined and the proposal has measures for an improved Employee Assistance Program (EAP). In terms of specific disciplinary actions, the bargaining committee requested a limit to the minimum disciplinary punishment if a GA is found breaking the discriminatory bathroom law. Our bargaining committee also presented proposals to protect GA contracts in the event of the passage of new laws, court rulings and new university regulations or policies. These are covered in Article 23 - Totality of Agreement, Article 24 - Severability and a new article titled UF Regulations and Procedures. The GAU Bargaining Committee has been working on many different proposals as we are re-negotiating the entire collective bargaining agreement this year. You can watch each bargaining session on our youtube channel. Updates on the other proposals are in last week’s newsletter. As we get more updates we will post a new detailed list. Upcoming Bargaining On December 1, we will be presenting some of our most important proposals–on healthcare and housing! We want to get y’all out-of-network coverage, better dental, vision and more. Please come to our bargaining session and show the University how much these changes would affect our lives! Be there: Reitz Union Rm 3320 or ZOOM, Dec 1st, 9:15 -11:30am. Organizing Updates: Every week, our organizing team has been tabling to get cards signed and increase membership! We now have around half of the number of cards we need to give our union another year to reach 60% membership. Checking out cards to members has been a success, so thank you all for helping us reach our goal! Our newest effort is text banking to get more GA’s to our tabling events. To lend a hand, come to an organizing meeting! Another way you can help our card campaign: If you are attending any end-of-semester or holiday events (think grading parties, club gatherings, department socials), let us get you some blank cards! Even taking 15 minutes at an event to get a few GA’s to sign cards makes a huge difference. Tips for Recruiting New Members: We have found that having face-to-face conversations with GAs in our unit and answering their questions has gone a long way to increase our membership rates and we hope that our members can do the same! One topic many GAs are often concerned about is dues. Dues are 1% of our salary, for most GAs this is $10-15 a paycheck. Most of these dues go to our associated unions. All units within the United Faculty of Florida (GA unions, and faculty members) pay 1% dues, so GAs make up a very small portion of this budget. These dues pay for things like fighting legal battles related to the recent union busting legislation, statewide organizing efforts and a large network of support. We are connected to UFF along with the Florida Education Association, National Education Association and American Federation of Teachers. The amazing part about having these larger associations backing our union is that we get benefits from every single one! We are also entitled to a free legal council, local discounts and some funds do get directed back to the GAU to support organizing efforts and payday parties. If you include all of these benefits, and the better contracts that we are always bargaining for, union membership practically pays for itself! Spread the word that union membership is worth the price, and comes with some great perks! https://www.ufgau.org/benefits.html Email us: [email protected] Join our office hours: None this week, M 11:30-1:30, T/W/R 8:30-11:30 (11/27-12/01) Find us at a tabling event: Reitz 11am-2pm Tuesday 11/21, T/W/R 11/28-11/30 Join Discord: discord Hi GA's,
We are very excited to be starting a weekly newsletter via email and this blog. In the longer blog post we will go into detail about every article we are bargaining on as well as organizing updates, committee updates and upcoming events! Comment and let us know what you would like to see! Upcoming Events: 11/30 - General Body Meeting, Cypress and Grove 6pm-8pm -> We will be voting to approve our budget and electing several officers 12/01 - Bargaining for Healthcare and Graduate Housing! -> We need members to attend and show that this is important! (same time, rm and zoom as 11/17) 11/14 Tuesday - Tabling at Reitz Union 11am-2pm 11/15 Wednesday - Tabling at Sun Terrace 11am-2pm 11/16 Thursday - Organizing Meeting and Phone-banking! 4pm-6pm Carr Hall (attached to Bartram Hall) Room 611 11/17 Friday - Bargaining Session! 9:15am-11:30am Reitz Union Room 3320 or ZOOM meeting, debrief - Tabling at Steinmetz Hall 11am-2pm *FEES DUE 11pm (avoid a late fee) *GAU Office Hours Yon Hall Room 224 (M 11:45am-1:45pm, T/W/R 8:30am-11:30pm) Committee Help Needed: Our Healthcare and International committees need your help! We are currently bargaining for changes to our health insurance policy and we need members interested in change to help contribute ideas and input! If you are interested in or concerned about GatorGradCare please join the committee! Email our chair Nathan Ardnt ([email protected]). If you are interested in joining our international committee please join our discord, and let us know! We need more input from international students and more members to help our committee thrive! Bargaining: UPCOMING - Dec 1st Bargaining session (9:15 -11:30am) GAU is presenting proposals for healthcare and graduate housing! We need GAs to attend and show that this matters to us! (Reitz Union Rm 3320 or ZOOM) The GAU has signed and agreement on Article 10. The minimum GA stipend will be raised to $19,000 for 9-month employees and $25,600 for 12-month employees, with an additional raise of $400 for 9 month contracts and $533 for 12 month contracts for all continuing employees that have not been formally disciplined. Read the post below, from the Alligator for more details! After coming to an agreement with UF and voting to approve the tentative proposal, our bargaining committee signed the proposal (in September). Since that time we have been waiting for the Board of Trustees to ratify the proposal so that it can go into effect. The board has confirmed that our proposal for Article 10 will be on the agenda for their two-day meeting December 7th-8th. The university has assured us that Article 10 should be ratified then. Once the raise is ratified, there will be back pay to the effective start date of Oct 1st. Each paycheck following ratification should be a $20 increase for all GA's and a $130 increase for those that were at the minimum stipend. This means around $80 and $450 on the first paycheck after ratification when you factor in backpay. Bargaining Updates by Article Outside of Article 10, the GAU Bargaining Committee has been working on many different proposals as we are re-negotiating the entire collective bargaining agreement this year. You can watch each bargaining session on our youtube channel. Articles 1 and 2 - Current Contract Langauge (CCL) -> Our bargaining committee has discussed with UF, agreed and signed the proposals for current contract language. This was regarding the recognition of the union and university rights. Article 3 - Consultation -> The committee is asking for at least one required meeting with the University president under certain conditions (e.g. a pre-approved agenda, no bargaining or policies discussed, etc.) Article 4 - Appointments, Reappointments and Terminations -> GAU has crafted a counterproposal which defines the letter of offer as separate from the letter of appointment (LOA). Currently only the LOA is legally binding which means that no multi-year agreements can be enforced. -> The proposal ensures that international students will receive payroll onboarding information well in advance to ensure they are paid when their appointment starts -> It also stipulates that UF must reassign a student when possible if their assistantship is “curtailed” mid-semester. When that is not possible the committee is requesting severance pay until the end of the LOA or up to 20 weeks (whichever comes first). This is to give the GA time to make other arrangements. Article 8 - Leaves of Absence -> GAU is proposing to make an exception to the current rule preventing first-semester GAs from taking paid leave for the birth of a child, adoption of a child, or placement of a child from foster care. Article 11 - Tuition Program -> UF argued against a previous proposal brought by the GAU which asked for the university to pay up to 12 credits for students required to do so by their department. They stated that they did not find any departments where this occurred. -> Updated GAU proposal primarily allowing students to request additional course credits to be paid for at the discretion of UF with the support of their advisor and department chair Article 13 - Unlawful Discrimination -> GAU presented a proposal with substantial changes including updates to definitions, clearing up processes, and ensuring additional protections for students -> A new section was added to specifically ensure reasonable access to gender neutral bathrooms -> GAU additionally requested that if any discriminatory legislation was passed, UF and GAU can open a dialogue for how to enforce legislation with the best interest of the GAs at heart Article 14 - Copyrights and Patents -> UF and GAU reached a tentative agreement, this is current contract language! Article 15 - Outside activities and “conflicts of interest” -> UF brought a proposal to clarify what conflict of interest is and the process students must take if this is the case using university regulations -> GAU has tentatively agreed to this change Article 16 - GAU Rights -> GAU proposed to change title of article from “use of facilities” to “GAU Rights” -> GAU proposal also called for updating released time (RT) to be 0.5 FTE instead of 0.33; the total FTE for RT was increased to allow for 13 RT students per year which is the same number currently offered for 0.33 FTE -> The proposal added provisions to require that UF inform the GAU of all offices on campus that have graduate assistants and to inform the GAU of all new GA orientations -> UF seemed receptive to the office provision but not to the orientation provision. Article 17 - Dues Deductions -> GAU signed the latest version of this article which had been open since the summer as “impact bargaining” from SB 256. This will likely be tentatively agreed to and ratified in 2024 along with the full book rather than on its own. Article 18 - Insurance Deduction -> GAU signed a tentative agreement on this article, this is current contract language! Article 20 - Other Employee Rights -> GAU brought a proposal to move the new provision of outside employment in the (waiting to be ratified) Article 10 and clearing up the language about conflicts of interest with outside employmeent. Organizing: Our card campaign is going well and we are about ⅓ of the way to our goal. We are working from all angles to increase both membership and number of card signatures. This includes tabling, attending departmental events, working with student orgs., and reaching out via targetted emails, phone calls and texts. Most importantly, our department stewards and active members are checking out folders and getting cards signed in their department! This has been the most successful strategy. We want to encourage any member looking to help to check out a folder and tell us about upcoming events! If you are attending an organizational meeting, seminar, social event, or even a class, bring a few cards and get a few signed! Every card counts and you can easily make it work with your busy schedule. If you can’t make it to our table, send us an email: [email protected], pop by office hours in Yon Hall or reach out on discord and we can find a way to get you some cards! We are also sending cards to members at satellite campuses, if you can get card signed at your satellite campus send us an email and we can mail cards, instructions and return postage direct to you! This week’s organizing meeting is Thursday 11/16 from 4-6pm in Carr Hall Room 611. We will be using a good portion of our meeting time to phone-bank and get more people to come out to our tabling events to sign cards! The Alligator Opinion|Columns
By Cassie Urbenz September 19th, 2023 Despite the attacks on unions from Florida's legislature, Graduate Assistants United has achieved a historic win for our members. As a certified labor union, we have the legal authority to bargain with our employer over our Collective Bargaining Agreement. Collective bargaining is essential to ensuring the dignity of our labor, as it is the basis for our right to directly negotiate terms of our employment contract, including working conditions and compensation. The series of bargaining sessions that began in January of 2023 has resulted in the largest raise to the minimum stipend UF-GAU has seen in its 50-year history, more than doubling our historic win last year. Our bargaining team has reached a tentative agreement that results in a $2,200 raise for graduate assistants on 9-month appointments, a $2,847 raise for GAs on 12-month appointments, a $400 merit raise for all 9-month GAs who have not been formally disciplined in the past year, and 12-month GAs of the same status getting a $533 raise. The implementation of this tentative agreement will improve the living conditions of most of our bargaining unit: around 1000 GAs across 145 departments will see a raise to their minimum stipend and most continuing employees will receive a merit raise. In addition to these raises, departments can no longer restrict outside employment unless prohibited by law, university regulation, or outside funding sources– meaning that domestic students can now work outside of UF to help make ends meet. Nothing will radicalize you like a bargaining session. January was quite some time ago, and the road to agreement was not easy. The lowest point in the negotiations was marked by a meeting in April where the UF bargaining team came without a proposal and instead chose to debate how GAs are expected to fund our education and livelihoods. At various points in the session, the university’s representatives said that we do not deserve a living wage and that loans are an option for supplementing our paltry incomes UF claims they are not responsible for keeping up with inflation or ensuring our minimum stipend meets the increasing cost of living in Gainesville. Even after this historic raise, our highest minimum stipend increase was in 2017. Rather than trying to summarize the nuances of these crucial meetings, we strongly encourage as many people as possible to attend and see what’s happening at these sessions. The university works because we do– however, because we are forbidden from striking, it is difficult to demonstrate to UF how much they need our labor and how imperative it is to compensate us fairly. Consequently, we are left in the obsequious position of pleading with the university by sharing our experiences of hardship. It is always a jarring experience to newcomers and bargaining veterans alike when the university conveys its utter lack of concern for our financial distress in these public meetings. The union’s message to all GAs and the University. GAU’s long term goal is to achieve a living wage for all GAs, which according to MIT’s living wage calculator, is close to $34,000. We want our bargaining unit to know that any agreement we reach that falls short of this mark is a compromise and a stepping stone toward this larger goal. We also believe it is in the university’s best interest to maintain its top public university status by compensating us at a rate that will attract the best researchers and teachers in the country. The reality is that, even with this historic raise to the minimum, we aren’t paid enough. When you aren’t among the long line of graduate students accumulating weekly at six in the morning on Thursdays at the Field and Fork food pantry, it can slip your mind. For those of us in those lines, it’s hard to forget. For context, even those paid over $10,000 above the current minimum barely meet the cost of living for Gainesville. As one of the GAs that currently makes the minimum stipend, this raise will be life-changing, and I’ll be able to secure reliable transportation thanks to this win. For those of us with pets, debt, medical expenses, and children, it can mean even more. Nevertheless, we have to keep our eyes on the prize and be clear about what our goals are. Until all GAs have a living wage, the struggle for better stipends will continue. [...] Want to make sure we keep our bargaining rights? Becoming a member is easy and affordable. The only requirement to be a member and help reach the new 60% goal required by the Florida legislature is to pay dues. Dues are only 1% of your paycheck, and are paid on payday to ensure minimal financial disruption. The benefits of being a union member (e.g., representation during grievances, free legal counseling, access to free food and drink at payday parties, local and national discounts) and those of maintaining the union (like bargaining) far outweigh the 1% cost (~8/biweekly, or $192/yr for those soon to earn the new minimum) considering savings from GatorGradCare ($2,400-$3,000/yr), fee relief (~$700/semester), and the raises we bargain for. For EVERYONE, joining GAU is easy! Due to a system update installed this past week, returning members can now use the new member link without creating a duplicate. You can simply visit this website: https://feacms.floridaea.org/portal/fasttrack/79/form and complete the form. You can alternatively visit our website at www.ufgau.com and navigate to “take action” and “become a member” to access the form. Cassie Urbenz, Brandon Silva, Hannah Jacobs, and Sikander Khare, GAU's Bargaining Chair, contributed to this report. |
BARGAININGCollective bargaining is the process by which labor unions negotiate with employers to reach a contract on terms of employment, including salary, health care, benefits, and workplace safety. Each year, GAU bargains with UF over such terms. Archives
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