Tag: Email Timeline

From Joe Klein
February 21, 2020

Dear Colleagues, 

I wanted to write again with some updates from the ongoing strike. 
Today was a historic day in labor history at the University of California. For the 9th day, graduate students, undergraduates, faculty, staff, lecturers, and others rallied at both entrances to campus. For the 9th consecutive working day, metro bus drivers refused to cross the picket line in solidarity with striking graduate students. Energy was incredibly high all morning as strikers donned costumes and danced to celebrate DOOMSDAY which many noted marks a new beginning, not the end, of the fight for COLA. In a massive show of strength, strikers peacefully shut down the entire campus. 

Late in the morning, a huge group of STEM graduate students marched from science hill to quarry plaza to join rallying undergraduates. From quarry plaza, a group of about 200 strikers marched to the west entrance of campus and peacefully closed it down, while allowing traffic from family student housing to flow. Meanwhile, hundreds of strikers marched through the streets from quarry plaza down towards the base of campus. A large group of faculty members met the march in front of faculty housing, and together faculty and students marched to the base of campus, where strikers had already peacefully closed the main entrance to campus. Students and faculty held a rally in the streets at the main entrance and shut down the intersection of Bay and High. Later, strikers from the west entrance marched down Empire Grade to join the main entrance picketers. By my own estimates, there were more than 1,500 students, staff, faculty, lecturers, and supporters rallying in support of the COLA movement. UCSC has now spent approximately $2.7 million dollars on the police presence at the picket line–and this is likely a conservative estimate.

Meanwhile, the COLA movement has now spread to all 10 campuses in the UC system. Today simultaneous actions were held across the state, as UCSB occupied an administrative building, UCLA held a 1-day strike, and massive rallies were held at UC Davis, UC Berkeley, UC San Diego, UC Merced, UC Riverside, while UCSF is beginning to organize their own COLA campaign. UC San Diego, UC Santa Barbara, UCLA, UC Davis, and UC Berkeley have all committed to striking in solidarity with UCSC strikers if threats of retaliation are carried out. Here at UCSC, hundreds of graduate students have pledged to refuse Spring TA appointments in the event of mass firings. 

Although strikers were prepared to submit grades if administration met them at the bargaining table, today in a meeting UCSC administration rejected graduate students’ attempts to discuss solutions to the strike, and reiterated their commitment to retaliation against strikers engaged in this labor dispute. Among other revelations, it was also disclosed today that UCSC administration has been censoring communications from at least some department chairs to their students and faculty, claiming the right to “vet” correspondence. 

In a stunning rebuke to administration’s punitive and divisive tactics, striking graduate students held a general assembly where they voted almost unanimously to stand together in solidarity and to continue withholding grades–and so the strike continues!

The COLA campaign was born out of the dire circumstances of graduate students at UC Santa Cruz who have been repeatedly thrown under the bus by their own administrators–administrators whose $500,000 salaries are topped off with lavish monthly housing stipends. And still, administration is and has been continually invited to negotiate in good faith to bring the strike to close. Graduate students ask for dialogue and a living wage; administration asks for obsequious compliance to a system of worker exploitation. UCSC is morally, not financially, bankrupt. 

However, today we saw something new: a new community of students, faculty, lecturers, and staff rising together in solidarity to demand the university that we want. The doomsday clock is just a few seconds to midnight, and midnight is just the beginning. 

Some of today’s action items: 

• Join strikers on the picket line, beginning Monday at 7:30am. Please bring friends! You can also bring supplies: sunscreen, coffee, hand sanitizer, healthy food, and large containers of drinking water are always in demand.   
• Donate to the strike fund to support striking grads and to provide material relief in the event of mass firings: gofundme.com/f/support-fund-for-striking-workers-at-ucsc  
• Faculty are encouraged to organize among themselves and to consider striking in solidarity with graduate students. 
• Cancel your classes and sections, and do not ask your students to cross the picket line. 
• 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 asking them to come to the table to work with graduate students and to rescind threats of retaliation for students demanding the ability to live where they work. 

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 in the streets–we are so grateful. 

See you Monday!

From Joe Klein
February 20, 2020

Dear Colleagues, 

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

For the eighth day, hundreds of graduate students, undergraduates, staff, lecturers, faculty, and others rallied at both entrances to campus. Energy was incredibly high throughout the morning, and for the 8th consecutive working day metro bus drivers refused to cross the picket line in solidarity with striking graduate students. UCSC has spent approximately $2.4 million on the police presence at the picket line. However as of today administration has offered nothing substantive–and so tomorrow the strike continues! 

Meanwhile, the strike is spreading. Friday February 21 will be a state-wide day of action across the UC system for COLA and against administrative repression. Strikers at UC Santa Barbara have occupied an admin building in solidarity with UCSC and over 400 graduates have pledged to begin a full teaching strike on Monday if UCSC graduates are fired. Strikers at UC Irvine also occupied an admin building today and are also organizing plans for their own strike. UC San Diego strikers shut down a major library today and are staging a strike for Friday. UCLA strikers today staged a sick-out strike and along with UC Berkeley are committing to withhold winter quarter grades if UCSC fires its striking grads. Berkeley is also delivering its own COLA demands to administration tomorrow and planning for escalating to a strike. UC Riverside and UC Merced are staging rallies and organizing for their own COLA campaign, and UC Davis is also organizing a teaching strike in solidarity with UCSC and to demand their own COLA. Across California, graduate workers struggle together. 

Here at UCSC organizers are planning a double-header DOOMSDAY Rally and Party whileCOLA4ALL Organizers are hosting a #FIREUSJANET party at the picket line (these events are free and open to the public). Strikers will rally all day at the base of campus, and at 11am a DOOMSDAY Rally will be held at the Quarry Plaza at followed by a march to join strikers at the base of campus for a 12pm rally and party. All campus community members are encouraged to attend. Janet Napolitano has been invited to be the guest of honor at the #FIREUSJANET party at the base of campus. The text of the invitation for the latter (attached) reads as follows: 

Dear Janet, 

We cordially invite you to our celebration on Friday February 21st 2020 at the picket line.

As our guess of honor, we invite you to 
FIRE US IN PERSON! 

There will be good food and great music. 

#BringTupperware #FireUsJanet 

Yours very truly,
@cola4all @payusmoreucsc @thepeoples.co

In the face of administrative attacks on students and our departments, many voices are now calling for building toward a general strike for all UCSC workers if our graduate workers are fired. To this end, there is discussion of faculty beginning to organize in consideration of a full teaching strike if UC admin should choose to fire its graduate students. Together as graduates, undergraduates, faculty, staff, and lecturers across the state, we are re-imagining what solidarity and mutual aid can look like at the University of California. 

Some of today’s action items: 

• PLEASE COME OUT FOR A DOOMSDAY / #FIREUSJANET PARTY! Join strikers on the picket line, beginning tomorrow at 7:30am, with a rally at 12pm. If you are so inclined, costumes are encouraged. Please bring friends! You can also bring supplies: sunscreen, hand sanitizer, healthy food, coffee, costumes for your friends, and large containers of drinking water are always in demand. 
• Donate to the strike fund to support striking grads and to provide material relief in the event of mass firings: gofundme.com/f/support-fund-for-striking-workers-at-ucsc  
• Cancel your classes and sections, and do not ask your students to cross the picket line. 
• 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 asking them to come to the table to work with graduate students and to rescind threats of retaliation for students demanding the ability to live where they work. 
• If you were a faculty member or student who witnessed or recorded video or photographs of police violence please write a description of what you saw and send footage to: mas1218@gmail.com. 

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 in the street and in the senate–we are so grateful. 

See you tomorrow!

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Strike Updates, Wednesday, Feb 19, 2020

For the seventh day, hundreds of graduate students, undergraduates, staff, lecturers, and others rallied at both entrances to campus. For the seventh day, all metro bus service to campus was disrupted by the picket line. In late morning, strikers at the main campus were joined by a group of faculty marching down from the women’s center in support of the cola campaign, and together students and faculty rallied at the base of campus chanting “No retaliation, yes negotiation!” Later in the day, parents, families, and children from family student housing marched from Westlake elementary school to join strikers on the picket line. Meanwhile, strikes and other actions are being organized and planned for this week at UC Santa Barbara, UC San Diego, UC Berkeley, UCLA, UC Irvine, UC Davis, and UC Merced. In anticipation of Friday, COLA4ALL Organizers are inviting Janet Napolitano to the picket line at the main entrance of campus for a Firing Party on February 21. #firemejanet #bringyourowntupperware

As of today, UCSC has spent approximately $2.1 million on the police presence at the picket line. However as of today administration has so far offered nothing substantive–and so tomorrow the strike continues! 

In an incredible show of support for the COLA campaign and against the threat of firing its graduate workers, today UCSC’s faculty senate passed two resolutions, the first against the use of “tattlebot” and other surveillance technology to undermine academic freedom, and the second to endorse graduate students’ call for a COLA. The second resolution, which passed by a 75% majority in a blind ballot, reads as follows: 

“Be it resolved that the UC Santa Cruz Academic Senate

1. Supports the graduate students’ and lecturers’ calls for higher wages commensurate with local cost-of-living increases,
2. Calls for the withdrawal of sanctions against striking and arrested students,
3. Affirms departmental autonomy in the assignment of TAships,
4. And urges the UC Santa Cruz administration and UCOP–in dialogue with striking graduate students and lecturers whose contract ended on January 31, 2020–to work swiftly to find fair and lasting solutions that honor each of these unit’s indispensable contributions to teaching and research at the University of California.”

In doing so, the Faculty Senate joins UCSC’s Graduate Student Government and Undergraduate Student Government in officially endorsing the COLA campaign. Faculty, lecturers, graduate students, and undergraduates stand together, while university administration currently stands alone. 

In addition to garnering resounding support from our own community here at UCSC, the COLA movement garnered even greater national political attention late this afternoon when Democratic Candidate Senator Bernie Sanders called on UC President Janet Napolitano to stop threatening UCSC graduate students, especially international students who face potential deportation.  

Together we invite UCSC administration to come to the negotiating table so we can bring this strike to an end. 

Some of today’s action items: 

• Join strikers on the picket line, beginning tomorrow at 7:30am. Please bring friends! You can also bring supplies: sunscreen, hand sanitizer, healthy food, and large containers of drinking water are always in demand. 
• Cancel your classes and sections, and do not ask your students to cross the picket line. 
• 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 asking them to come to the table to work with graduate students and to rescind threats of retaliation for students demanding the ability to live where they work. 
• If you were a faculty member or student who witnessed or recorded video or photographs of police violence please write a description of what you saw and send footage to: mas1218@gmail.com. 
• Share media coverage of the strike (Bernie Sanders chose this NPR story, but there is also coverage in most major media outlets). 

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 in the street and in the senate–we are so grateful. 

Strike Updates, Tuesday, Feb 18, 2020

For the sixth day, hundreds of graduate students, undergraduates, faculty, staff, lecturers, and others rallied at both entrances to campus. For the sixth day, all metro bus service to campus was disrupted by the picket line. In the afternoon, a huge group of STEM graduate students wearing lab coats once again marched to join the picket line, and joined strikers in peacefully shutting down the main entrance to campus, for the sixth consecutive working day. As of today, UCSC has spent approximately $1.8 million on the police presence at the picket line. By the end of this week, the figure will be approximately $2.7 million. Administration has so far offered nothing substantive–not even non-retaliation for those who they are asking to capitulate–and so tomorrow the strike continues!

In response to the cartoonish threats of administration and UCOP to fire hundreds of graduate students for participating in the strike, COLA strikes and actions are planned at every UC campus for this week. Tomorrow UCLA graduates are staging a sickout strike, and UCSB is considering going on a full strike to demand their own COLA. Meanwhile, UCSC undergraduate student government announced that they are introducing resolutions to investigate the offices of UCOP and UCSC administration, and to explore recalling EVC Kletzer for endangering students and negligence in the handling of this crisis. 

Tomorrow the UCSC faculty senate will meet to vote on two resolutions, one condemning the threats of the university to fire its graduate students and the infringement on faculty rights and academic freedom, and a second calling for higher wages and departmental autonomy in hiring and advocating for a meaningful resolution to the strike. 

To be very clear: The university’s current position is that they would rather destroy entire departments, including almost all of the social sciences and humanities at UCSC, and fire hundreds of graduate students than to have a single substantive meeting to discuss a solution to the cost of living crisis. This would willfully lead to graduate student homelessness, lack of access to medical care, and deportation for graduate students who already barely get by. That position is hopelessly reckless and must be abandoned. 
Alternatively, strikers once again invite the administration to the table to have a substantive conversation about the material conditions in which we live and to bring the strike to a peaceful end. 

Of note: More than a few strikers are ready to begin pushing for a university in which administrators are made irrelevant, and in which workers–faculty, students, and staff–govern the university collectively. One supporter asked: How much longer until we abolish the UC Regents and truly return this university to its core missions of teaching and research by placing it in the hands of its teachers, students, and scholars. 
Some of today’s action items: 

• Join strikers on the picket line, beginning tomorrow at 7:30am. Please bring friends! You can also bring supplies: sunscreen, hand sanitizer, healthy food, and large containers of drinking water are always in demand. 
• FACULTY: Please attend tomorrow’s faculty senate meeting and vote in favor of the resolutions condemning administration’s threats and in support of the COLA campaign. 
• Cancel your classes and sections, and do not ask your students to cross the picket line. 
• 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 about how you feel about Lori Kletzer and Cynthia Larive threatening to fire hundreds of graduate students for demanding to be able to afford to live where they work. 
• If you were a faculty member or student who witnessed or recorded video or photographs of police violence please write a description of what you saw and send footage to: mas1218@gmail.com. 
• Share media coverage of the strike. 

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!