Upcoming Local 4121 Meetings, Events, Trainings
Our monthly membership meetings are the 2nd Thursday of the month at 5pm. Our next meeting is December 14th (tomorrow!) at 5pm on Zoom. Please RSVP here. At this meeting we will:
- Approve agenda
- Approve minutes & board actions
- Solidarity with Mt. Sinai Postdocs on strike
- Elections Committee
- Working Group Updates
- ASE Bargaining Survey and Initial Bargaining Demands
- 2023 Reflections & 2024 Strategy Breakouts
- Adjourn
All members in good standing are automatically nominated for the Elections Committee, which consists of up to seven committee members and one alternate. You can accept your nomination by emailing elections@uaw4121.org by 5pm tomorrow, or accepting your nomination at the membership meeting.
Political Workgroup –The decisions made by our government officials impact our working conditions and daily lives. Given this, Political Work Group is currently interviewing and reviewing questionnaires from candidates running for state office, and you can help review these requests for endorsements too! Email political@uaw4121.org today to join our next half hour interview and/or learn more!
International Solidarity Workgroup – Postdocs won reimbursement for J-1 and OPT fees in our current contract, but we have not seen any action from UW yet towards providing those reimbursements. The International Solidarity Workgroup is meeting next on Tues, Dec. 19 at 2pm to plan our next steps. Please fill out this RSVP form for the Zoom link!
Housing Justice Workgroup –Recent changes to the MFTE housing program are preventing hundreds of Graduate students from finding and staying in affordable housing in Seattle. The Housing Justice Workgroup is meeting next on Tues, Dec. 19 at 3pm to discuss our plan to push against this. Fill out this RSVP form to join this meeting!
Undergrad Organizing Committee – Are you an undergrad? Not an undergrad but want to build power with undergrads & hourly workers? Ready for something awesome? Join the Undergrad Organizing Committee! By coming together through our union and identifying shared issues to address through collective action, we can advocate for better working & learning conditions for us and a better UW. Swing by our Orientation meetings in January to get involved in campus-wide union orientations to spread the word about important rights & protections that undergraduate academic workers have. Got questions or just wanna chat & share your thoughts? Hit up the Undergrad Organizing Committee at ugrad-organizing@uaw4121.org!
Organizing 101 Training – Our union is made up of members and it is only through organizing our colleagues that we can build a strong community of colleagues to win and enforce strong contracts. Increasing our organizing power is critical since ASEs are back at the bargaining table in the beginning of 2024.
If you are someone who talks with your colleagues about department or university happenings, then good news, you are already doing the work of organizing! Please join an upcoming Organizing 101 training to enhance your skills. There is one more session this month on 12/18 and several scheduled in January.
RSVP HERE to attend a training with colleagues from across the ASE, Postdoc, and RSE units!
Local 4121 Announcements
Academic Student Employees – Initial Bargaining Demands Launched – Through the bargaining survey, area meetings, organizing committees, and 1-1 conversations, ASEs made it clear what we want to see changed and where we want to focus our energy during bargaining. To let UW Admin know that they should take our negotiations seriously, all ASEs need to sign on to the IBDs! UW Admin needs to know that we stand together in support of these demands and are ready to fight for the contract we deserve.
Postdocs and Research Scientists, you can support by asking the ASEs you work around whether they’ve signed on yet!
Slack – Reminder that we have a Slack workspace for all 4121 members! You can join by filling out this form.
Solidarity at UW
Professional staff here at UW’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation(IHME), represented by SEIU 925, are currently bargaining their next contract with UW. They are fighting for issues such as fair compensation and access to paid parental leave. (RSEs and postdocs, sound familiar?) They held an action earlier this week and members of our union joined in solidarity.
IHME action for fair contracts on 12/11/2023
Beyond UW
In higher ed, there are some big updates from this week:
- 500+ Postdocs at Mt. Sinai’s Icahn School of Medicine (SPOC-UAW) are in the second week of their strike after a year of negotiating with their employer for an equitable first contract. Donate to their strike fund today and join UAW Region 6 members this Friday, 12/15 at 11am for an online fundraiser towards SPOC’s strike fund!
- Last week, early career researchers at the NIH won their union, NIH Fellows United-UAW by 97.8%!
- Grad workers at Brown University reached a tentative agreement this week and are voting to ratify a new contract.
Fur-One-Two-One Pet of the Week
Oh, hi—I’m Caroline, a two-year-old calico. When my human Nelson Niu comes home from working toward his math PhD, I permit him the honor of giving me lots of pets and snuggles. If they’ve had a particularly fruitful day of union organizing, I may even give them some playful licks. While I prefer to hide from strangers who dare set foot in my domain, Nelson actually enjoys meeting new people, so go ask them about ASE bargaining instead of bothering me.
If you’d like to submit your pet to be featured, please email comms@uaw4121.org
In Solidarity,
Justin Applegate
Luci Baker
Rebecca Bluett
Brant Bowers
Francesca Colonnese
Natasha Crepeau
Iván Cruz
Pat Erickson
Brendy Fountaine
Max Friedfeld
Abby Gambrill
Connor Gettings
Soohyung Hur
Levin Kim
Peter Lindquist
Avi Matarasso
Nicel Mohamed-Hinds
Deborah Nemens
Nelson Niu
Katie Osterhage
Marissa Parker
Sarah Pristash
Mara Rafferty
Tahiyat Rahman
Anastasia Schaadhardt
Natalie Wellen
Ryan Will
Jayden Wood
Tricia Wu
Yuying Xie
Candice Young