The Next Phase of the COLA Struggle

TL;DR: The present conditions require us to shift into a new phase of organizing—as a first step, sign up to phone bank to help push us towards a sanctioned strike this quarter, and sign the ULP strike pledge for a sanctioned union strike.

The start of the new quarter gives us an opportunity to step back and assess the state of our movement. Our new working conditions in the age of COVID-19 are forcing us to reconsider our tactical choices. We know that we must continue to organize for the COLA we all need, but it is time to organize differently.

Until now, our offensive tactics have been wildcat strike actions. We held our ground most impressively in a grueling, month-long physical picket line at the Bay & High intersection, gathering widespread public support and igniting wildcat activities on other campuses. But we also faced serious and demobilizing setbacks. Disciplinary retaliation and sheer fatigue took their toll. Administrators and faculty joined forces to find new and inventive ways to prevent graduate workers from withholding final grades. The pandemic obliterated our familiar methods of in-person organizing. We must take these setbacks seriously, re-evaluate our collective power, and recalibrate our tactical horizons.

To that end, COLA organizers at UC Santa Cruz will agitate in the coming weeks for the authorization of our union’s statewide ULP strike. The first step is to sign up for phone banking. The second is to call meetings with, and call people in, your departments to spread the ULP strike pledge.

What is the ULP strike?

Our union, UAW 2865, has filed multiple Unfair Labor Practice (ULP) charges against the UC, including for its summary firing of over 80 wildcat strikers at UCSC, and for its refusal to bargain directly with the union over COLA. These unjust practices are severe enough that UAW’s statewide Bargaining Team is prepared to call an official strike, but only if enough union members are ready to withhold their labor when the call comes. The UAW’s current position on settlement for these ULP charges includes a raise to $40,000 per year for graduate student workers.

Why the ULP strike? 

Make no mistake: the possibility of a ULP strike is a concrete victory in the COLA movement, and a genuine victory of the wildcat strike. Whereas we, as rank and file workers, once stood far ahead of the union, the union is now beginning to catch up to us. We are now well placed to combine our rank and file militancy with the union’s considerable resources and legal protections. 

The current crisis conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic compound our precarious living conditions. In the thick of this crisis and the uneven distribution of its effects, the demand for a COLA is the demand to survive. We want to struggle, as workers all over the world are now struggling, with a renewed urgency. But we need protections, and we need greater numbers. On the eve of a historic economic depression, and with 3.3 million unemployment claims filed across the country last week, many among us are gaining a hesitancy about engaging in bold but risky wildcat actions, especially when confronted with an employer that would rather leave its workers without healthcare in a pandemic than bargain over a living wage. 

A ULP strike is distinct from a wildcat strike because it is voted on by the full union membership, sanctioned by the union, and gives legal protections to every single worker on strike. These protections are necessary certainties in these uncertain times. They will allow us to strike against the university with the full weight of our statewide union behind us. 

When will the ULP strike be? 

The ULP strike is not the opposite of a wildcat strike. Both forms of strike are nothing without the power of the rank and file. If you have been following the official emails from our statewide union leadership, you may be under the impression that it is only a matter of waiting for the leadership to tell you when to strike. 

But the truth is that our union leadership is cautious in its political outlook, and will only be decisive when pushed to decision from below. If union members muster up strike readiness in large numbers, leadership can be compelled to call a strike vote sooner. Otherwise, they will hesitate and postpone, and allow the weeks of Spring quarter to pass by. In other words, rank and file workers can determine the timeline of the ULP strike. 

What happens to the withheld grades?

You may have heard about the administration’s “Last Chance Agreement” to reinstate fired wildcats. Due to the absurdly tight timeline (less than 24 hours) and the ambiguities of this “offer,” COLA wildcats have written to administrators asking for clarifications and outlining a counter-proposal.

Moreover, the reinstatement of Santa Cruz graduate student workers is a central plank of the UAW’s terms for settling its ULP charges. It is uncertain how this will play out and we will need to adjust strategically to developments in negotiations, at our campus, and on other campuses. 

As with everything in the COLA struggle, the speed and terms of any outcome will depend on our strength at the time of negotiations. Our strongest position, at present, is to negotiate during a statewide sanctioned strike. 

What we have always said nonetheless remains true: only Santa Cruz wildcats (and now wildcats at other campuses) decide when to submit grades, and under what circumstances. 

Next

As we start the new quarter, we will regroup, reassess and rebuild infrastructure. We will be sending a survey over the next few days which will ask grads your thoughts on the strengths and weaknesses of the COLA movement so far, and what you want to see happen with the campaign going into Spring quarter. We will join a statewide intercampus General Assembly Friday April 3 at 11am (Zoom link forthcoming), and there will be a UCSC General Assembly soon (details TBC).

All of us have faced enormous uncertainty over the past months. Now, more than ever, is the time to build our collective strength to fight for a future full of security and certainty.

In power and solidarity,
COLA organizers

Counter-Offer to Latest Deadline, “Last Chance Agreement”

To UCSC Administration,

We first register our dismay that your latest deadline to turn in grades (details attached) arrived to us with less than 24 hours to respond. Some fired graduate workers have not received the offer and many will simply miss the email as they adjust to the uncertainty of the pandemic. 

The Santa Cruz wildcat strikers have always been open and responsive to good faith communications, initiating multiple requests to negotiate, including a “grade trade” offer back in February—all refused by administration. Instead of negotiating with us collectively and in good faith, the administration’s approach aims to instill panic in individual grade withholders in a renewed attempt to undermine collective action. The COLA movement, however, will continue to make decisions collectively.

In that vein, we are unable to respond to this deadline without clarifications on the following points:

  • Will fired graduate student workers who are now not able to find a spring appointment receive compensation?
  • Will GSIs who have had their class removed receive compensation?
  • Will those graduates who were made ineligible for spring appointments (rather than fired from an existing spring appointment) receive compensation if they are unable to find a new appointment?

With affirmative clarification on the above points, the COLA movement will agree to collectively submit grades under the following terms:

  • The removal of all disciplinary measures from student records for past actions related to the wildcat strike, including the grading strike, the picket line, campus shutdowns, the ARC office takeover, and dining hall takeovers, and the guarantee not to further pursue student conduct procedures against students who were involved in these actions.
  • A guarantee of full reinstatement for the spring quarter for all fired graduate student workers, including TAs and GSIs and those graduate students made ineligible for spring appointments, along with full compensation for those who cannot find an appointment at this late time.
  • A guarantee of eligibility for future ASE appointments for all fired graduate student workers.
  • That the administration remove clause E: “In the event XXXXX is terminated from employment pursuant to this Agreement, XXXXX waives her right to a Skelly hearing. XXXXX and the Union acknowledges and agree that the parties waive their right to file a grievance or complaint with the University of California, the courts or any governmental administrative agency concerning her dismissal for failure to adhere to the terms and conditions of this Agreement.
  • A guarantee that this offer be expanded to students who are withholding Winter quarter grades.
  • An expansion of the $2,500 housing supplement to all graduate students including MA students, MFA students beyond the 2nd year of their program, PhD students beyond the 5th year of their program, and all fired graduate students.
  • A written commitment to advocate for UCOP to immediately engage in good faith bargaining with UAW 2865 over a Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) for all ASEs in the UC system. We are not striking to be reinstated; we are striking for a COLA.

The context of the global COVID-19 pandemic has only intensified the urgent need to make fired workers whole. The University of California cannot remain content with a wishful vision of “online business as usual” while its imperiled workers struggle to adapt to drastic changes in their working and living conditions. Now more than ever, graduate student workers, including those of us who are immunocompromised or otherwise particularly vulnerable to COVID-19, need job security, a living wage, and freedom from unjust and arbitrary discipline. 

We are open to negotiation, as we have expressed and pushed for throughout this strike. We ask that you renege your bad faith offer and meet our good faith one. We expect clarifications and an answer to our terms by the end of the week, Friday 11:59pm.

Signed,

UC Santa Cruz Wildcat Strikers

ATTACHMENT TO BOTTOM OF EMAIL: Word Doc of “Last Chance Agreement” 

______________________

Kavitha’s email: 

Hi everyone, 

I wanted to send you an update on your Notices of Actions to Dismiss and the emails you received telling you that you would not be eligible for ASE employment in the future.  

As many of you have likely heard, management has agreed to offer jobs for the spring quarter and in quarters thereafter to all of you, should you decide to submit grades by 5pm today or if you have already submitted the rest of your fall quarter grades. Attached is a template for such an agreement, though it would be tailored to your specific case. 

If that timeline is too short and you need another day, please be in touch. Like nearly any agreement for reinstatement for these types of activities, the agreement for you would likely include, like the one attached, a limit on future wildcat grade withholding.  

I hope you’re all safe amidst the ever-changing conditions of COVID-19.  

Sincerely,

Kavitha

Text of the Last Chance Agreement

Last Chance Agreement Between

XXXX 

And

University of California, Santa Cruz

And

UAW 2865

March 29, 2020 

The University of California Santa Cruz (hereinafter referred to as the University), XXXX (hereinafter referred to as XXXX and the United Auto Workers 2865 (hereinafter referred to as Union) enter into this Last Chance Agreement (hereinafter referred to as Agreement). 

Acknowledgements

On March 26, 2020, XXXX received a letter notifying her that she would be dismissed from her spring teaching assistant appointment in XXXXX effective March 31, 2020 for failing to turn in fall quarter grades after a directive from interim Campus Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor Lori Kletzer.

 On or about March 27, 2020, the University received information from XXXX regarding her submission of fall quarter grades. XXXXX submitted documentation, including two letters of support from her fall and winter quarter instructors of record, as well as a personal letter discussing that she remains committed to taking actions in the best interest of her students now and in the future.

On March 28, 2020, the University confirmed that XXXXXX submitted her fall and winter quarter grades.

In light of XXXXX subsequent grade submission and commitment to her students, the University agrees that it will not seek to dismiss XXXXX with the Union’s agreement to the following: 

Terms and Conditions

  1. Upon signature of this Agreement, the Notice of Dismiss dated March 26, 2020 and all supporting documents including but not limited to the Notice of Intent to Dismiss and Skelly recommendation, will be withdrawn. None of the listed documents will be placed in XXXXX personnel file. Without a dismissal on file, XXXXX will retain her spring quarter 2020 teaching assistant position in XXXXX.
  1. XXXXX is required to meet the standards of performance required of an academic student employee position, including but not limited to adherence to the  description of duties form, compliance with Regental policy 1111, and timely and accurate submission of grades for all quarters in which she holds an academic student employee appointment from the date of signature on this Agreement through the date XXXXX graduates from her degree program or separates from the University, whichever is earlier.  Her failure to meet these standards will subject her to automatic dismissal and loss of future eligibility for an academic student employee appointment with the University from the effective date of this Agreement.
  1. Nothing in this Agreement precludes XXXXX from engaging in protected, concerted activity.
  1. XXXXX acknowledges and agrees that her continued employment with the University is contingent upon her compliance with the terms and conditions of this Agreement, and that her failure to comply with all terms and conditions of the Agreement subjects her to dismissal upon execution of this Agreement.
  1. In the event XXXXX is terminated from employment pursuant to this Agreement, XXXXX waives her right to a Skelly hearing XXXXX and the Union acknowledges and agree that the parties waive their right to file a grievance or complaint with the University of California, the courts or any governmental administrative agency concerning her dismissal for failure to adhere to the terms and conditions of this Agreement.
  1. The parties further agree that this Agreement shall not serve as a precedent for the resolution of any other issue or grievance and that this Agreement shall not be precedent setting.
  1. Nothing contained herein shall be deemed an admission by the University of any misfeasance or liability whatsoever.
  1. It is further agreed that XXXXX and the Union will not grieve this Agreement.
  1. If any provision, or portion of any provision(s), of this Agreement is found to be invalid or unenforceable, such provision or portion thereof shall be deemed severed and the remaining terms of the Agreement shall remain in effect.

This Last Chance Agreement incorporates the entire understanding between the parties and recites the sole consideration for the promises exchanged herein. In reaching this agreement, neither party has relied on any presentation or promise except as expressly set forth herein. Each of the undersigned parties hereby acknowledges that a representative of their own choosing has represented them and that they understand and fully aware of the contents and legal effect of this Last Chance Agreement and agree to be bound by the terms contained herein.

///

///

Date: Date:

For the University: XXXXX

____________________________ ____________________________

Jennifer Schiffner,

Director, Employee & Labor Relations

For UAW 2865:

____________________________

Kavitha Iyengar, President

I am withholding grades today

Email from graduate student to UCSC Chancellor and Executive Vice Chancellor on the day Winter quarter grades are due.

To the administration,

Despite the world-sized cloud of severe uncertainty the Covid-19 global pandemic has thrown us into, I am certain nevertheless that I will not be submitting grades today. The conditions of precarity that many the world over are newly experiencing – fear of falling ill, fear of job loss and financial ruination, feelings of isolation and powerlessness – these were already more than familiar to us, driving us to begin our movement for a COLA in the first place. We needed one before, and now we need one more than ever.

I am speaking for myself. The 80+ graduate student teachers you sacrificed were striking for the same cause I am striking for, so I withhold grades in solidarity. As a movement we have always made decisions collectively, but acted autonomously. And so I speak autonomously. But in this time of imposed isolation, it has become starkly clear that we have never been autonomous; that we think and we act on each other’s behalf; that in all our particular acts we nurture and further a co-allegiant goal. We striking graduate students, ourselves, gathered the funds to lift out of total penury the 80+ students you terminated. In keeping, I sincerely hope you are staying safe and enjoying the company of your loved ones in this precarious time of isolation and apprehensiveness. In keeping, while you may thank this pandemic for having shut down campus in lieu of us shutting down campus, and while you may thank this pandemic for virally overtaking the news cycle in lieu of stories of your brutality and our victories, do not for one moment think or thank Covid-19 for shutting down the strike. It has only more keenly affirmed us of our foundational resolve, and more firmly reminded us of our need to organize.

So I repeat, I myself am withholding grades today. I’m uncertain what sort of retaliation you are planning towards myself and others like me; your recent action against 80+ graduate student workers was unconscionable then, whereas a similar retaliatory action now would likely place you in a circle of…well, I’ve been reading a lot of Dante. I would ask instead that you respond to us with a COLA, that you use your administrative power to act as an exemplary model of what community leaders can do for their members in times of crisis. I don’t care if that’s naive. We are a community in crisis, and you can do something about it. Do something about it.

This is not a plea, this is a suggestion; generosity looks better than Randian intransigence. Either way we’ll get our COLA.

Sincerely,
Jared Harvey
PhD Candidate in Literature

Drop the Rent

We come into the COVID crisis after months of struggling to be paid enough to live in Santa Cruz, one of the most expensive rental markets in the US. 

More than 80 of us were fired in the process, now scrambling without our second and third jobs. Undergraduates are choosing between grossly overpriced housing on a closed campus and the uncertainty of securing housing in a closed economy. Residents of Santa Cruz, losing their “non-essential” jobs, remain compelled to participate in the “essential” economy—paying rent to landlords.

Although all residents of Santa Cruz lived in a crisis long before COVID, it is especially acute and urgent now. 

A group of Santa Cruz housing activists and organizers from the COLA movement at UCSC ask you to fill in this survey (droprentsc.com). We are developing a network of tenants, both affiliated with UCSC and not, to gauge the political will for tenant organizing in Santa Cruz around rent forgiveness, eliminating rent burden, and forming mutual aid networks.

If our county won’t introduce proper rental protections, if our employers will not pay us enough to live here, if our state won’t support us through the pandemic,

Then we will drop the rent ourselves.

What does the pandemic change about our strike?

We want to begin by acknowledging the exhaustion and anxiety many of us are experiencing. For us at UCSC, the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic comes amidst an already tumultuous year. Like so many faculty, staff, and undergraduate students, we are tired, we are stressed, and we desperately want to see a resolution to the ongoing strike. 

Over the last week, strikers have been asked, “Why, in the face of a global health pandemic, would you continue striking for a COLA?” Sometimes, this question is followed with concern for undergraduate students who, without a doubt, have endured an unusual and stressful quarter. More often, this question is posed alongside the assertion that there are much larger matters to attend to, now. While we agree that we are in the midst of a crisis, we strongly disagree that this crisis gives us reason to pause our labor action. In fact, we argue that the crisis itself gives new urgency to our strike demand and renders our victory all the more necessary. We are writing to explain why. 

First, for those of us living paycheck-to-paycheck, the ability to access emergency provisions in our moment of crisis is virtually impossible. Many of us have no savings. Most of us have no family or generational wealth to draw on. The financial insecurity that compelled us to demand a COLA is now compounded by crisis-related expenses (unexpected travel, additional childcare costs, medical supplies, aid to relatives and loved ones, to name just a few).  

Second, given the exorbitant cost of living in Santa Cruz, it is not uncommon for graduate student-workers to work additional jobs. These second and third jobs are necessary to supplement the inadequate wages we receive as TAs and GSIs. However, since the order to “shelter in place” began, graduate student-workers, like workers around the country, are reporting being formally laid off or told to stay home without pay (who knows for how long, though a federal report estimates at least 18 months). With people losing their second and third jobs, the demand for a COLA is the demand to survive

But beyond the ways in which the economic precarity of graduate workers is compounded by the crisis, it also needs to be pointed out that this precarity itself compounds the crisis.  The University can grant sick leave and move all instruction online, but so long as it continues to underpay its workforce, requiring grads to continue to seek out second and third jobs (now as “essential” Instacart shoppers, DoorDashers, and Amazon delivery drivers) in order to make rent in Santa Cruz, it is still contributing to the likelihood that its workers, out of desperation and unable to forego supplemental employment, will contribute to the spread of the virus.  Therefore, organizing against economic precarity is very directly about addressing the conditions that produce this pandemic.  

We know from the history of labor organizing that crises are most definitely not when a pause is called for in our work for a more just society.  To treat a national emergency as something that must supersede all other demands we place on our employers and our governments is to all but guarantee that the crisis will be resolved to the benefit of those in power and on the backs of the most vulnerable.  The greatest gains for labor of the last century came as the result of a decade and a half long national strike wave that took place in the midst of the successive crises and national mobilizations of the great depression and the Second World War.  The workers who led these strikes knew that if they bracketed their demands during these global emergencies, the world that emerged would be one that was worse for working people.  

The idea that a crisis is a time when everyone’s interests align in the face of a greater shared danger is a quaint fantasy.  This danger is never shared evenly.  In the present moment, workers around the world are taking strike action and demanding what they need from their employer to live. They are striking not in spite of the pandemic but because of it.  Their demands—our demands—for economic justice are demands to end the intolerable inequality that both exacerbates and is exacerbated by the COVID-19 outbreak.  

The University has the ability to negotiate with us and to resolve this matter immediately. Now, more than ever, we (and all low-wage workers) need a living wage! 

Solidarity forever,

Striking graduate students

COLA: Re: This Week’s Emails from Public Affairs

Dear grads,

This week, communications have gone out from Public Affairs to instructors about final grades for Winter courses. These communications appear to suggest that, when grads go on strike, undergraduates have to choose between a) taking an incomplete and b) requesting a grade (in a number of ways and forms). 

However, this is not the case – instructors can still request to submit a partial roster. Below is a template to send to undergraduates. FOG is working on a more detailed response to go out to faculty by tomorrow. 

In solidarity,

—–

[Dear all,]

Communications have gone out [TODAY] to students about final grades in winter quarter courses. 

The communications may have made it appear that you are choosing between two things: 

a) taking an incomplete, or 

b) requesting a grade, either 1) as a P/NP, or 2) as a letter grade from your TA or 3) from [YOUR INSTRUCTOR’S NAME], who would then be [picking up struck labor/ forced to take on labor outside of [THEIR] contract/ grading you with partial information.] 

However, you do not need to do either of these things. Instructors can request to submit a partial roster, meaning that if you do not request a grade from your TA, the grade will simply be missing. This is the same situation as Fall Quarter, and it will not harm you (apart from in a few very specific scenarios – again, you can consult our flowchart below to see if you need a grade).

Please contact me if you have any concerns. 

All best,

[   ]

Information and Resources Re: Withholding Winter Grades

Dear fellow grads,

We are reaching out with additional information and guidance about withholding grades for Winter quarter. Though the procedures are basically the same as for Fall, we want to reiterate the power of withholding grades as leverage against the administration in our fight for better working conditions. 

In addition, we want to remind everyone of the powerful movements that have developed at other UC campuses in the few short months since fall quarter ended. These movements are advancing rapidly at all campuses, but especially at UC Santa Barbara, UC San Diego, UC Davis, and UC Berkeley, all of which are now engaged in wildcat strikes. It is crucial to remember that we are not alone in this fight. The wildcat grading and teaching strikes across the UC, along with the unfair labor practice (ULP) lawsuits filed by the union against the UC, are further building our power to bring the UC to the bargaining table. In this moment, it is essential that we maintain our position and withhold as many grades as possible for Winter quarter, along with our colleagues at UC Santa Barbara, UC San Diego, and UC Davis.

Please see the “How to Strike” document for detailed information about how to withhold grades. However, please note the following key pieces of information:

  1. Failing grades: We recommend posting failing grades immediately, as these will impact a student’s progress and may have a more negative impact if they show up unexpectedly later.
  2. Winter graduation: If a student is unsure about whether they need their official grades posted in order to graduate in Winter quarter, the most important question is whether they need an official transcript in the near future to prove their graduation (say, to an employer), or whether it can wait. If a student has applied to graduate in Winter quarter, the Registrar usually cannot clear them to graduate until all official grades are posted. However, it is important to remember that the Registrar can (and often does) backdate a student’s graduation to their transcript–if the student finished their degree requirements in winter 2020, that is what their transcript will reflect (even if, for example, that degree is not officially posted until sometime in spring quarter). 
  3. Admin emails asking for individual grades: Last week, several instructors received emails from the Registrar’s office indicating that grades were needed for specific students, either due to Winter 2020 graduation or for undisclosed reasons. In any case in which you/your instructor receives emails from the Registrar, the Financial Aid office, or similar entities, a good first step is to reach out to the specific student(s) mentioned in the emails. They have likely received communications from these offices as well; they can decide if they want their official grade posted. 

Again, the most effective way to support the movement right now is to withhold winter grades. Use the attached how-to document, the grade request flowchart, and the template for emailing undergraduates to guide you through the process. The administration is going to extreme lengths to punish strikers and to calculate/input fall grades without negotiating with TAs–they want these grades very badly, which underscores the power of this tactic.

In solidarity,

Striking graduate students

Response to “Operational changes in response to COVID-19 virus”

From gsa_pres in response to UCSC’s announcement to suspend in-person classes in response to coronavirus:

COVID-19 is being used by university administration to assume emergency powers that can profoundly impact the way that academic work is done. There have been years of resistance to the move to online education. We see the university’s turn to emergency measures as a rehearsal for a permanent shift to large scale online instruction, accelerating the creep of online teaching with little oversight, with no bargaining, and with little to no transparency. As UCSC looks for ways to operate in the Spring after losing around 80 graduate student employees, the turn to online learning would set an alarming precedent for how a university can function without its workers. 

At UC San Diego, administration has already made the cynical move of asking instructors to ensure that a gradebook on Canvas remains updated, on the pretext that course staff may become ill and be unable to process students’ grades. Graduate student-workers’ greatest power is to withhold our labor; actions like this undercut our ability to withhold our labor. Grads will continue to withhold Winter grades, and as such must resist pressure from above to put grading information online.

This has immediate consequences for faculty and undergraduates. This was a top-down decision made without input from instructional faculty, who must have autonomy over pedagogical decisions. In the immediate context, faculty face overwork in redesigning classes on the fly. For undergraduates, this is not the education that they paid for. Online teaching is a poor substitute for learning in a classroom, and has been shown to diminish the value of a university education

As both the strike and the threat of coronavirus spread across the other UC campuses, gatherings in large groups will become more difficult as our movement grows. On our campus, this will mean that rather than focusing on maintaining a physical picket, our attention will turn to the digital picket. 

The digital picket means:

  1. Don’t submit.
  2. Keep grades off Canvas.
  3. Don’t hold classes online.
  4. Undergraduates should submit their assignments directly to their TAs.

Strike Updates Day 20

From Joe Klein
March 9, 2020

Dear Colleagues, 

I wanted to write again with some updates from the ongoing strike. 

For the 20th day graduate students, undergraduates, faculty, staff, lecturers, and others rallied in support of a COLA. Today marks the 1 month anniversary of the full teaching strike that began in February. This week the picket line is coming to campus, moving each day to a new location as we continue to organize, build community, and build power. For the first day of week 10, in solidarity with the UCSC Undocu Collective, strikers took over the Academic Resource Center (ARC). Energy was high all day as strikers continued to organize and plan for the ongoing strike. As of today administration continues to ignore our demands–and so the strike continues! Tomorrow the picket will move to a sit-in at the Earth and Marine Sciences Building, beginning at 9am. 

One month ago, in response to months of UCSC administration ignoring Undocumented students’ demands for greater support, including for a dedicated space to serve the undocumented community, members of the Undocu Collective occupied and took over an office in the ARC to demand that the space become a new headquarters for Undocumented Student Services. Rather than respond to the demands and concerns of the collective, UCSC administration retaliated against these students by issuing code of conduct violation summons for some of those who participated in the protest, and banned these students from the ARC–which should be a community space open to all students. These students who are working tirelessly to support themselves and their community are threatened with suspension or expulsion by a university that brags about its diversity while doing nothing to support its struggling student body. We know this pattern well: students exercise their right to make a claim on the university for the resources they need, and are met with retaliation. Their fight is our fight. 

In stunning news from our statewide union UAW 2865, leadership today announced that graduate students across the UC system have voted overwhelmingly (97% of respondents) to ratify union demands to reopen contract negotiations and to fight for COLA across the state. Today leadership began circulating a pledge to gauge support for moving to an Unfair Labor Practice (ULP Strike); this would mean that all graduate students across the state would be legally protected to go on a full strike. You can fill out the pledge here, and encourage your colleagues to do so as soon as possible. If enough students sign the pledge this week, a vote to authorize the strike could come as soon as next week. 

It should go without saying that this move by our statewide union would not have been possible were it not for the courage of UCSC strikers and grade with holders to risk their own livelihoods to fight for all of us graduate students, and for the months of organizing work by our comrades and colleagues, both graduate and undergraduate, who helped this movement build power to fight for a better university that actually works for its students and workers. UCSC organizers today issued a statement on the relationship between this movement and the ULP strike, noting that only the wildcats on each campus will decide when to end the strike once the demand for a COLA has been met. To avoid this strike, university administration is once again asked to come to the negotiating table, including by California Assemblymember Mark Stone and 11 other representatives from across the state in an open letter.

Meanwhile, across the state the wildcat strike is spreading faster than ever. UC Berkeley today announced that it will join UCSC and UC Santa Barbara on full teaching strike effective next Monday. UC Davis and UC San Diego continue their own grading strike, while UCLA is expected to announce its own strike soon. Following similar actions at UC Santa Cruz led by COLA4ALL and The People’s Coalition, today organizers at UC Santa Barbara liberated a dining hall on their campus to provide free meals to all students. These actions not only feed hungry students, but help us to imagine what might be possible in a university that works for its most vulnerable. 

Some of today’s action items: 

  • Join strikers at Earth and Marine Sciences, beginning tomorrow at 7:30am. Please bring friends! You can also bring supplies: coffee, hand sanitizer, and healthy food are always in demand.
  • Teach the strike: Guide available here  
  • Donate to the strike fund to support striking grads and to provide material relief to our fired grads: gofundme.com/f/support-fund-for-striking-workers-at-ucsc Please share the strike fund with your networks!
  • Faculty are encouraged to discuss moving to a full teaching strike.
  • Cancel your classes and sections, and do not ask your students to cross the picket line, especially this coming Monday and Tuesday.
  • Lecturers should consider holding their classes at the picket. 
  • Push back the dates of large assignments, or as some instructors have done, cancel them. 
  • Write to the administration demanding that they come to the table to work with graduate students and to rescind the decision to fire nearly 100 graduate student workers. Guides and samples available here.
  • Call Gavin Newsom’s office to complain about the firing of graduate students, the extreme rent burden of graduate students, and to ask that $310 million be allocated for a UC wide COLA. Click here for contact information. For reference see the Faculty Organizing Group letter to Gavin Newsom

As always, thank you so so much for your support, and extra special thanks to our undergraduates and to the faculty who have been coming out to support strikers–we are so grateful. 

See you tomorrow!

We Are Moving the Picket Line

For one month, UCSC wildcat strikers have maintained a full picket at the base of campus. Over this period, Metro buses have refused to cross our picket line, alongside thousands of grads, undergrads, faculty, lecturers, staff, technical workers, and UPS drivers. Our strike has spread across the UC system and has gathered major press coverage, donations, and support from around the world. It has invigorated collective imagination about the future of the university and graduate education in the UC system. This would have no doubt have been less effective had we not been out on the picket line every day for four weeks. 

The picket line has been a central site of organizing the strike thus far, and has served as a meeting place for so many of us who did not know each other before. It has served as a space for debate, deliberation, and mutual aid. As a result, it has also been subject to intimidation and attacks from police, reckless or belligerent drivers, and further threats by the administration—all of which have, of course, failed to stop this movement. 

After much discussion, however, it has become clear that our strategy must change. Much of our vitality as a movement lies in our adaptability. For the final week of the quarter, we are advancing our picket line up the hill and into the heart of campus. Our picket line will roll through different locations across the week, beginning at 9am in McHenry on Monday. We encourage the entire campus community to join us. 

Our work stoppage continues.

More information on the week’s events will follow. See you on the rolling picket.

Solidarity forever,

Striking Graduate Students