Add your name today to the Pledge to Respect Picket Lines should Postdocs and Research Scientists go on strike.
Our Postdoc and Research Scientists A-4 colleagues have been bargaining with UW Administration for more than eight months. Last February, members in both bargaining units overwhelmingly voted to authorize strikes should UW Admin continue not to bargain in good faith. Throughout negotiations with both units, UW Admin has been stalling and blatantly disregarding the law, including committing Unfair Labor Practices in both units.
UW Administration’s tactics are nothing new, nor are they unique to the current contract negotiations with our Postdoc and Research Scientist colleagues. Academic Student Employees (ASEs) have been up against the same challenges time and time again for the last twenty years, and we know for certain that we will face them as we negotiate our own contract in less than a year.
As members of the ASE Bargaining Team and the ASE Organizing Committee, we strongly recommend that all ASEs sign on today to the Pledge to Respect Picket Lines.
“An injury to one is an injury to all” is not just a pithy saying; it’s a call to action for us to engage in transforming our shared working conditions through visible & meaningful collective action across institutional divides. Each and every one of us signing on to the pledge demonstrates that RSEs and Postdocs are not alone, and that we will not let management get away with engaging in unlawful activities with any of our bargaining units – now or in the future. If they get away with it now, they’ll undoubtedly try it again when we are negotiating our own contract.
As Elliot Lee—an ASE in Microbiology—put it at the SLU rally on Monday, “Our fights are fundamentally connected across contract campaigns, across labs, across departments.” In the event of a strike, UW Administration will undoubtedly push to continue “business as usual,” including trying to minimize disruption. Signing on to the Pledge to Respect Picket Lines is the important first step to committing to strategize together as ASEs to maximize the disruptive potential of a strike. The more of us sign the pledge and actively participate in discussions around what this could look like, the more powerful it will be.
Sign the pledge today! If you have any questions or want to get involved in organizing, check out the action items in this Linktree and reach out to ase-organizing@uaw4121.org.
In Solidarity,
UAW 4121 ASE Unit Executive Board & Bargaining Team
Justin Applegate, Biochemistry
Ana Bennett, Information School
Francesca Colonnese, English
Soohyung Hur, Geography
Levin Kim, Information School
Brianne King, Chemistry
Avi Matarasso, Bioengineering
Nicel Mohamed-Hinds, Physics
Tahiyat Rahman, Physics
Anastasia Schaadhardt, Information School
Audrey Seo, Computer Science & Engineering
Samantha Thompson, Geography
Natalie Wellen, Applied Mathematics
Yuying Xie, Geography