When we show up, they back down!
Today, all of us, the MEMBERS of the GEO, won a crucial victory in our contract negotiations with the administration! We are now one step closer to achieving the goals of our bargaining platform. Around 80 graduate employees and allies demonstrated outside of our first federally mediated session and the message was loud and clear: “We want to focus on the contract, not ground rules!”
Despite rumors that the meeting was held in a soundproof room, all of the members of the Bargaining Team (and, for that matter, of the administration’s bargaining team) will assure you that we heard the rally loud and clear. Your enthusiasm, your excitement, your swagger (all at 8:30 AM during the summer, no less) pressured the administration into abandoning its position on ground rules—a scant 5 minutes after the session began! With that issue put to rest, the federal mediator was able to step aside. Then, although the administration seemed ready to call it a day, our team persuaded them to begin discussing some elements of the GEO proposal face-to-face. We responded to a series of questions about our proposals for union rights and appointment notifications.** Nonetheless, we have yet to hear the administration’s own proposals, nor would they commit to a date for our next negotiating session.
Discussing the contract itself is a major step forward, but we still have a lot of work to do. By all appearances, the administration team remains committed to their stalling tactics. We need to stay informed and continue to keep the pressure on. Aside from attending future rallies and events, there are a lot of everyday things that we can do – our victory today should be celebrated, and we should all be talking to our friends and coworkers. Share the news on your department listservs or on your facebook pages. Then we need to make sure that all of our colleagues are members, and that we’re contacting people in our departments to get them involved. More than anything else, we all need to keep our energy level high, and keep publicly agitating for a fair contract!
Several people and groups deserve recognition for producing today’s positive outcome: the bargaining team, coordinating committee, communications committee, all of the people who helped with organizing and phonebanking, our allies in the Campus Labor Coalition, and many others. But most importantly, we need to thank US – the MEMBERSHIP. Seriously – the membership really turned out in force for the rally, and we know from past experiences that rallies outside of negotiating sessions, ESPECIALLY when mediation is involved, really put positive pressure on the administration team to move beyond stalling tactics to the important issues of the contract negotiations. So thank you for your hard work and dedication!
Finally, we’re already starting to see some positive press coverage about our efforts – check out the DI article at http://www.dailyillini.com/news/campus/2009/06/01/graduate-students-rally-support-contract-negotiations and stay tuned for information about more press coverage.
For more information about the contract itself – what we’re trying to accomplish in this negotiating session – please check back here at geocontract.org, or contact me at odell.campbell@gmail.com.
Talk to you all soon,
Peter
**For more information on these proposals, please contact me – “union rights” basically refers to the GEO being able to hire graduate assistants, and “appointment notifications” refers to our desire to have stronger language as to when notifications of TA and GA appointments need to be sent out by departments.