WE WON BULLYING PROTECTIONS!
First, the great news! After months of continued pressure by Postdocs and thousands of other UAW Academic Workers, we’ve reached a tentative agreement with UC on the Respectful Work Environment article of the contract. Finally, our contract will enshrine enforceable and binding mechanisms to prevent bullying in the workplace and protect those who experience abusive conduct:
- Clear timelines to investigate and resolve abusive conduct under the grievance process including appeal to third-party arbitration if necessary,
- A strong definition of abusive conduct with clear examples of abusive behavior that will allow us to enforce protections,
- Worker-centered protections and interim measures – for example, a Postdoc can work from a different lab or work remotely while their issue is being resolved,
- Secure protections that prevent UC from changing definitions or resolution procedures unilaterally.
We also reached agreement on the Grievance and Arbitration article on an improved process to ensure faster resolution of all workplace issues, including bullying, harassment and discrimination. These are huge wins and demonstrate that all our organizing to create pressure on UC to agree to our contract demands is working! Now we’ve got to build on this momentum and keep escalating our actions.
UC’s wage proposal is insufficient in many ways
The University also submitted their latest economic proposal and it falls far short of what Postdocs need to live in California. They have proposed a base salary of $59,362 to counter our proposal of $70,000. UC’s negotiator described its proposal of increasing the current minimum salary by 6.7% as “lucrative” but this still doesn’t come close to addressing the increasing cost of living. And Postdocs at peer institutions like Stanford or USC are already making much more while being paid by the same types of grants we are. UC’s package also included higher health care premiums for Postdocs by up to 58%, and requires us to drop all our proposals on housing subsidies and relocation costs. During a period of high inflation and while many UC campuses are setting grant funding records, this is completely unacceptable.
UC’s package included a childcare subsidy for Postdoc parents (let’s not forget this is something they’ve been promising for over 5 years…) but it excludes all first-year Postdocs for no clear reason. Overall, the University’s continued lack of respect for the value that Postdocs bring to UC makes clear that to win more victories like we just did on bullying, we must continue to escalate the pressure through mass collective action In addition, UC offered nothing on our other key economic issues, such as increasing minimum appointment length (and visa length), addressing the climate crisis by subsidizing green transportation options, and increasing paid family leave. All proposals can be viewed on the tracking sheet. Overall, the University’s continued lack of respect for the value that Postdocs bring to UC makes clear that to win more victories like we just did on bullying, we must continue to escalate the pressure through mass collective action..
Join critical October Mass Membership Meetings to help plan our next steps
Across the state, the over 48,000 UC workers represented by UAW—Postdocs, Academic Researchers, Academic Student Employees and Student Researchers—will be holding joint membership meetings to discuss how we can most effectively exercise our mass collective leverage. These will be critically important gatherings where we will show UC that we are deeply committed to winning a fair contract. Please click here to RSVP now for your campus meeting!
In solidarity,
Postdoc Bargaining Team and Alternates
Brad Barker, UC Merced
Margot Bezrutczyk, LBL
James Boocock, UCLA
Joyce Chan, UC San Diego
Sierra Durham, UC Davis
Jordan Eizenga, UC Santa Cruz
Srividya Ganapathy, UC San Diego
Olivia Gunther, LBL
Eileen Jeffrey Gutiérrez, UC Berkeley
Yoko Hiraoka, UC Riverside
Evan Holloway, UC San Francisco
Jade Moore, UC San Francisco
Ingrid M. Padilla Espinosa, UC Merced
Evan Plunkett, UC Santa Barbara
Raul Rodriguez, UC Berkeley
Pummi Singh, UC Davis
P.S. Follow your union on Twitter @UAW5810!