GSOC/UAW Local 2110 is the union of teaching, research and graduate assistants at New York University. As the chosen representative of the majority of NYU graduate employees, the Graduate Student Organizing Committee (GSOC) is committed to restoring collective bargaining rights for our membership and forcing NYU to once again recognize our union, as it did when GSOC and NYU signed a contract governing graduate employment in 2002. Collective bargaining gives employees a say in their working conditions by empowering chosen representatives of those workers to negotiate with employers over issues like pay, workload protections, workplace safety and benefits.

While TAs, RAs and GAs at public universities -- including the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, University of California, Berkeley, and many other research universities -- have enjoyed collective bargaining rights for decades, with the 2002 GSOC contract, NYU graduate employees became the first at any US private university to unionize and, through collective bargaining, secure a living wage, workload protections and stable health benefits for NYU graduate employees. Collective bargaining and the resulting 2002 contract provided NYU graduate employees with:

· an average 40% raise in salary, with guaranteed raises every year
· fully-paid healthcare with improved benefits (instead of $1000+/year out-of-pocket to buy health insurance)
· sick leave and bereavement leave
· an independent, fair procedure to work out workplace issues
· paid TA training and workload protections

These gains, won through the strength of our union, applied not only to graduate employees, but also extended to students on fellowship. By providing a living wage, workload protections and healthcare for graduate employees and graduate students on fellowship, our GSOC contract set a new and enhanced standard for wages and benefits offered by both private and public universities across the nation. These protections provided by the contract improved working conditions for graduate employees, and the resulting stability in turn improved learning conditions for our students.

After our contract expired in 2005, however, NYU hid behind a partisan 2004 ruling by the Bush-appointed National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and refused to negotiate a new contract with our elected bargaining team.

The 2004 NLRB decision had reversed its own bipartisan ruling just five years earlier that extended protection to graduate employee unions at private universities and colleges. The partisan 2004 ruling instead removed legal protection from graduate employee unions at private universities by deciding that workers enrolled as students at private universities were not employees, and therefore not entitled to the protection of federal labor law and the "right" to form a union.

When NYU refused to renegotiate the contract, the teaching and research assistants went on strike. The strike began in November 2005 and continued until the end of the academic year in May 2006, making it the longest strike ever carried out by a union of NYU employees. Although GSOC is no longer officially recognized by NYU and graduate employees are no longer protected by the security of a union contract, GSOC continues to fight for the collective bargaining rights of NYU graduate workers and to bring NYU back to the bargaining table.

GSOC has not been alone in its struggle to restore collective bargaining rights to graduate employees. Since the 2002 contract's expiration and in the aftermath of the strike, the right of graduate employees to collective bargaining has been endorsed by thousands of scholars and human rights advocates. In 2008, the International Labor Organization, an agency of the United Nations, condemned the 2004 NLRB decision that stripped graduate employees of our collective bargaining rights for violating international labor standards of freedom of association. In April 2008, the UAW and our labor allies in Congress also introduced federal legislation, the TA and RA Collective Bargaining Rights Act, which overturns the 2004 NLRB decision by amending the National Labor Relations Act to extend internationally recognized collective bargaining rights to graduate employees at private universities and colleges.

In addition, President Obama's recent appointments to the National Labor Relations Board have renewed our hope that the Bush-era decision will be overturned and our rights will be restored. On April 26, 2010, we announced that a majority of graduate teaching and research assistants support the union, as certified by the American Arbitration Association. And on May 3, 2010, we petitioned the NLRB for a new union election.

You can help us restore our rights and win a great new contract that will improve our working lives. Contact GSOC to get involved!