Membership Meeting Tomorrow at 5pmAs a reminder, our next membership meeting will be tomorrow, Thursday 4/8 from 5-6pm via Zoom. To access the link and/or call-in number, please fill out this short form. All members in good standing are encouraged to attend, and anyone who is not yet a member can sign up here beforehand. Please login five minutes earlier to help expedite the check-in process. The proposed agenda for the meeting is as follows:
For more information about how the meeting will be structured and how you can use Zoom’s features to participate, check out this page on our website. If you have any specific concerns or accessibility needs, please reach out at uaw4121@uaw4121.org. Equity Survey Closes Friday!Please take 10 minutes now to complete the 2021 Equity Survey! The more people who participate, the better we’re able to demonstrate to UW administration we are committed to making UW an equitable place for all to work and learn. Further, our annual survey is a way of gathering long-term information about the specific harassment, discrimination, and inclusion issues ASEs and Postdocs are facing at UW. As with the last two years’ surveys, the results will be used to propel future work to address structural causes of inequity, so it’s critical that every ASE and Postdoc participate to ensure the results will be as compelling and representative as possible. This survey is administered through Catalyst in order to track who has filled it out, but your responses won’t be connected with your identifying information. For more information and to get involved, email epicprogram@uw.edu and/or anti-discrimination@uaw4121.org Postdoc Childcare Fund Enrollment is now open!Postdoc caregivers: enrollment is now open for the Postdoc Childcare fund. Enroll today. The Postdoc Childcare Fund is now accepting responses for the first half of 2021. Our collective bargaining agreement provides for a caregiving fund of $45,000 in 2021 that is distributed semiannually. Funds will be distributed in June for Postdoc caregivers who worked at UW anytime from January to June 2021. If you are a Postdoc parent or caregiver, enroll today. Please reach out to the Family Friendly Workgroup with any questions or to get more involved. Undergrads and RSOs Support ASE Contract Demands!Our union has continued to gather support for our ASE contract negotiations from the UW community, most recently with three RSOs issuing formal endorsements. This illustrates the breadth of support for our proposals, and the fact that we are not in this struggle alone. Read and share the endorsements below!
Kshama Solidarity: State Supreme Court Sides With the Right-Wing RecallLast week the Washington State Supreme Court sided with the right-wing recall campaign against Councilmember Kshama Sawant, allowing the recall campaign to begin collecting signatures to get on the ballot. On Saturday, community members rallied in Cal Anderson Park in solidarity with Kshama, and over 50 volunteers went out to canvass District 3 and get out ahead of the recall campaign. We’ll need to continue this momentum and seize the moment to defend our bold working-class representative in City Hall. Union members can help by:
Op-Ed: UW’s work-abroad declaration perpetuates harm for the international communityThe International Solidarity Working Group authored an op-ed in the UW Daily about the recent policy requiring ASEs working from abroad to file a declaration committing to a date for returning to the US. We have filed a grievance about this policy, as it has disproportionate impacts on ASEs working remotely from non-US locations. We also recognize that this is the latest in a series of policies that have deeply impacted international ASEs, all underscored by misguided notions that ASEs are abroad simply out of convenience. These assumptions continue to perpetuate harm through the haphazard and ineffective policies that they are translated into. If you have been asked to sign such a declaration, or want to get involved in organizing around these issues, please get in touch with the International Solidarity Working Group (intl-solidarity@uaw4121.org). In Solidarity, Douglas Avella-Castro |
