This piece reflects the views of the author, David Purucker, and not those of Emerald Media Group. Send your columns or submissions about our content or campus issues to [email protected].
Opinion: A union means power for you, your coworkers and all students at UO.
———-
This fall, UO students have a chance to make history.
Between October 5 and 24, undergraduate student workers will vote on whether to form a labor union, called UO Student Workers (UOSW).
A labor union is an organization of workers who act together to advance their interests by bargaining with their employer.
Unions mean a better life for workers. With a union, working people can claw back some of the value they produce for their employers, by raising wages and reducing the speed and intensity of work.
UOSW was founded two years ago by student workers who believed that the only way to improve the situation for workers on campus is by building power from the bottom-up.
UOSW will be a “wall-to-wall” union that includes nearly all undergrad student workers employed at UO. Food-service workers at the dining halls, RAs in dorms, research assistants, rec center workers and many other groups of workers will all be included — nearly 4,000 in total!
In the American higher education system, undergraduate workers do essential labor for their universities, but almost none of them are organized in their own unions.
In the last few years, that’s started to change. Earlier this year, dining hall workers at Dartmouth College formed a union and won mental health and sick pay and a $21 per hour minimum wage. RAs at Columbia University organized to win a 1,300% increase in their stipends and cut mandatory weekend hours in half.
These are inspiring victories, and transformative for the workers involved. UOSW aims to match or exceed those gains — a living wage, fair scheduling, a two-week pay period, shift meals, protection for international student workers and much else — but at a much larger scale.
Even before official certification or bargaining for a first contract, student workers at UO have already organized to win significant improvements. Last year, RAs successfully pressured university housing managers to win a 65% increase in their stipends, while dining hall and Zero Waste workers won $2 per hour increases to their starting pay.
UOSW is the first wall-to-wall union breakthrough at a big public university anywhere in the country. That’s why all eyes in the undergrad student worker movement are on us — if we win our union and negotiate a strong first contract, workers at UO could open the door for hundreds of thousands of other student workers all around the country to see that they could do the same.
Student workers fight for all students
What if you’re a student who isn’t working on campus? You should care about student workers, because they’re fighting for you too!
The working conditions of student workers are the living and learning conditions for all students. UOSW workers prepare and serve the food at dining halls that most students depend on each day, and then they pick up and process all that trash and recycling.
They help students pass their classes as tutors. They run the rec center and other student programs that are a vital part of campus life. And they provide essential support for students in campus housing as RAs.
Finally, when student workers organize, they can fight for the common needs of all students. With a union, student workers can demand and bargain for increased public investment in essential services, like housing, food services and academic support.
Alongside other campus unions and the broader labor movement, UOSW workers can even fight back against the creeping privatization of our university, and instead demand a democratic model of higher education as a right that’s free for all, not a commodity purchased through debt.
How you can help
If you’re a student worker, watch your uoregon.edu email for your official ballot, and vote yes!
Not a worker and want to help? There’s lots you can do. You can talk to student workers you know and tell them about the union. You can sign-up to volunteer in a support role to build awareness about the union. Most importantly, you should never cross a picket line if and when workers go on strike to fight for the common good.
For the first time in decades, workers around the United States are on the offensive, fighting back against an economy that works for the billionaire class but not for ordinary people. That movement is sweeping over higher education, and this year it’s coming to Eugene.
By voting yes for UOSW, and standing with undergrad and graduate student workers when they bargain and strike, UO students can get in the fight and make history.