UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Monday, March 11, 1996
7A
Graduate teaching assistants turn to labor unions
Administrators perceive GTAs as apprentices not employees
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Call it academic class warfare: Graduate students across the country, tired of growing teaching duties and diminishing rewards, are turning to labor unions for support.
The graduate teaching assistants say they want more job security, better benefits and, eventually, higher wages. Administrators counter that they are students and apprentices, not employees.
Only a handful of such unions exist mostly dating from organizing efforts of the early 1970s. But labor
And students who understand how to organize in the age of e-mail are being seen as the next generation of grass-roots labor leaders.
"This is a group of young workers who are highly-educated," said Phil Kugler, organizing director of the American Federation of Teachers. "Bringing their talents, perspectives into the labor movement ... is a big plus."
officials say the recent recognition of a union at the University of Kansas and campaigns under way in California and Illinois are signs of a new trend.
And graduate assistants do more teaching.
The trend in higher education has been for professors to spend more time on research and less on classroom instruction. Universities seeking savings hire fewer full-time professors to replace retirees.
At the University of Illinois-Urbana, graduate student Nicole MacLaughlin said that she picked texts for her English and creative writing courses, and graded tests without a professor's help.
"You begin to look at them like employees when you realize they're doing a sizable percentage of the instructing, and they often teach for
She is now on academic leave to work with the
three or five years," said Perry Robinson, the federation's higher education director.
"You begin to look at them like employees when you realize they're doing a sizeable percentage of the instructing..."
federation to organize teaching assistants.
"We feel that we do the basic teaching and research at the university, and that's something we'd
Perry Robinson Higher education director for American Federation of Teachers
really like to get out publicly and have people know," she said.
Universities, on the other hand, argue that teaching assistants are training to be professors, so their classroom work is like an apprenticeship.
president. "As part of the pedagogical experience the graduate students are asked to teach."
"Yale views its graduate students to be primarily students, not employees," said Gary Fryer, special assistant to Yale's
Teaching assistants receive free tuition plus a stipend — up to $4,500
"We believe the appropriate relationship between students and their faculty is not collective bargaining," Fryer said. "The normal mechanism is discussion."
But Scott Dexter, president of the teaching assistants' union at the University of Michigan, said the union has helped student-faculty relations since being recognized in 1975.
a semester at Yale.
"It makes relationships much more collegial precisely because the union provides both a buffer and a formal process that people can go through, which tends to remove the personal element from any conflict," Dexter said.
Teaching assistants say their stipends aren't much to live on and note that they lack job security.
"Our issue is not so much that we're starving and need a union to force the university to concede more," said Jim Caine, a University of California, Berkeley, student. "The position of most of us is that things are getting worse, and as it is
right now, we have no say in what could happen with our next pay-check."
Officials at the federation, which represents about 7,000 graduate students at five colleges, call the Kansas Public Employees Relations Board's recent recognition of teaching assistants as employees a turning point.
The board analyzed hours and courses and found, among other things, that assistants are increasingly teaching outside their area of study.
Many labor officials noted that students are ahead of the technological curve when it comes to organizing. All receive e-mail and are comfortable working with computers.
Robinson calls the graduate student unions "a place for the new leadership to develop."
"The ones I've met, they've surprised me in their readiness to do the work, to take the risks, to subordinate their own career objectives to the broader cause," Robinson said.
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CUTTING EDGE DANCE COMES TO LAWRENCE
8:00 P.M., WEDNESDAY,
MARCH 13, 1996
LIRED CENTER OF KANSAS
- Tickets on sale at the Lued Center Box Office (864-ARTS): Murphy Hall Box Office (864-3982); SU Box Office (864-3477) and all Ticketmaster Call Centers; Ticketmaster at 913) 234-4545
STUDENT
SENATE
Nationally renowned author Prof. Joseph T. Collins
Students for Wildcare
tells his "Snake Tales"
7pm Tuesday March 12 in the Frontier Room at the Burge Union Prof. Collins' book signing following the speech
A Good Jayhawk Is Always Prepared. How Prepared Were You?
Attend the 47th Annual Principal Counselor Student Conference to talk to your former counselor and principals about your preparation for and adjustment
to KU!
Caldwell — B
Canton-Galva — B
Chaparral — Big Twelve
Chapman — B
COMMUNITY COLLEGES
Allen County — B
Barton County — B
Butler County — B
Cloud County — B
Coffeyville — B
Colby — B
Dodge City — B
Garden City — B
Haskell — B
Highland — B
Independence — B
Johnson County — Regionalist
Kansas City Kansas — B
Pratt — B
KANSAS HIGH SCHOOLS
Cheney — B
Cimmaron — B
KANSAS HIGH SCHOOLS
Andover — B
Arkansas City — B
Atchison — B
Atchison County Community High — B
Basehor-Linwood — B
Beloit — B
Beennington — Kansas Room
Bishop Ward — B
Blue Valley, Stilwell — Oread
Blue Valley Northwest — Malott
Bonner Springs — B
Buhler — B
Burlingame — B
Burlington — B
Colby — B
Coldwater and Protection — Big Twelve
Concordia — Big Twelve
Council Grove — B
Emporia Malott
Decatur Community — Big Twelve
Derby — Centennial
De Soto — Big Twelve
Downs — Big Twelve
F.L. Schlagle — B
Fort Scott — B
Kickapoo Nation School — B
Goddard — B
J.C. Harmon — B
Jackson Heights — Parlor C
Jefferson County North — Parlor C
Junction City — Malott
The University of Kansas
Haven — B
Hayden — B
Hays — B
Healy — B
Hiawatha — B
Highland Park, Topeka — Alcove B
Holton — B
Humboldt — B
Hutchinson — B
Immaculata — Parlor C
Independence — B
PRINCIPAL-COUNSELOR-STUDENT CONFERENCE and COMMUNITY COLLEGE CONFERENCE Kansas Union
Labette County — Alcove D
Lansing — B
Lawrence — Parlor A
Leavenworth — Big Twelve
Room Schedule for Student Conferences
10:20 a.m.-11:50 a.m.
Tuesday, March 12, 1996
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Ness City — B
Newton — Oread
Nickerson — B
Olathe North — Curry
Olathe South — Curry
Osage City — Big Twelve
Osawatomie — Big Twelve
Osborne — Big Twelve
Ottawa — Big Twelve
Pacla — Big Twelve Plainville — Big Twelve Protection (with Coldwater)
Madison — Big Twelve
Marais Des Cygnes — B
Meade — B
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Rossville — Malott
Russell — B
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Salina South — Centennial
Seaman — Regionalist
Shawnee Heights — Alcove G
Shawnee Mission East — Pine
Shawnee Mission North — English
Shawnee Mission Northwest — Engli
Shawnee Mission South — English
Shawnee Mission West — English
Southeast of Saline — Kansas
St. Thomas Aquinas — International
St. Xavier — Kansas
Sumner Academy — Kansas
Tescott — Kansas
Room Guide:
Room Guide:
Rooms in the Kansas Union:
B = Ballroom — Level 5
Alcoves — Level 3
Big Twelve Room — Level 5
English Room — Level 6
Governor's Room — Level 4
International Room — Level 5
Jayhawk Room — Level 5
Malott Room — Level 6
Oread Room — Level 5
Pine Room — Level 6
Parlors — Level 5
Regionalist Room — Level 5
Walnut Room — Level 6
Thomas More Prep — Kansas
Tonganoxie — Kansas
Topea — Governor's
Turner — Kansas
Ulysses — Kansas
Washburn Rural — Alcove A
Washington — Centennial
Wellington — Centennial
Wichita East — Centennial
Wichita Heights — Centennial
Wichita Northwest — Centennial
Wichita South — Centennial
Wyandotte — Centennial
ARKANSAS HIGH SCHOOLS Fayetteville —Big Twelve
MISSOURI HIGH SCHOOLS
Chaminade — Kansas
Lee's Summit — Kansas
Lee's Summit North — Kansas
Notre Dame de Sion — Kansas
Park Hill — Kansas
Parkway West — Kansas
Rockhurst — Kansas
Ruskin — Kansas
St. Teresa's — Kansas
NEBRASKA HIGH SCHOOLS Millard North — Big Twelve
NEW MEXICO HIGH SCHOOLS
Albuquerque Academy -- Big Twelve