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February 2025 Newsletter

William A. Herbert, Executive Editor

Daniel Cronin, Student Editor

Jenna Salem, Student Editor

In this month's newsletter, we provide the agenda, the confirmed panels and speakers, and registration information for our 52nd annual conference on March 23-25, 2025. The conference will take place at the Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute and the CUNY Graduate Center in New York City. We strongly encourage you to register and participate in the conference.

The conference theme is Unity in Defense of Higher Education and Collective Bargaining, which emphasizes the critical need for an alliance of all stakeholders within higher education in these extraordinary times to defend our shared fundamental values. We will be gathering this year during a national crisis when our shared core values are under attack: higher education, collective bargaining, academic freedom, DEI, scientific research, the administrative state, and democracy itself. To quote the late Lou Reed, “This is no time to ignore warnings.This is no time to clear the plate. Let's not be sorry after the fact. And let the past become our fate."

This newsletter includes original research about collective bargaining relationships involving interns, residents, and fellows employed at public and private university-affiliated hospitals and medical centers. The research is an outgrowth of a panel discussion at last year’s annual conference and reflects the National Center's continuing effort to broaden our research and programming to include all higher education employees, as well as professional employees in other industries.

In response to the growing attacks on federal labor rights, the newsletter includes information and links about existing state constitutional amendments and state laws that grant collective bargaining rights in private employment. Those state labor law provisions might become very important if the courts sustain current constitutional challenges to the National Labor Relations Board.

The newsletter also includes findings and hyperlinks to the National Center's 2024 studies: Anti-Discrimination Clauses in Higher Education Collective Bargaining Agreements and the 2024 Directory of Bargaining Agents and Contracts in Institutions of Higher Education.

Lastly, the newsletter includes news about representation cases involving student employees at Clark University, Macalester College, and the University of Vermont along with information about recently published books of interest, and the National Center's peer reviewed Journal of Collective Bargaining in the Academy.

Register Today for the National Center's 2025 Annual Conference

Registration remains open for our 52nd annual conference, which will take place on March 23-25, 2025 in New York City with the theme of Unity in Defense of Higher Education and Collective Bargaining.

To register for the 2025 annual conference click here.

For the conference schedule: click here.

The following is a list of currently confirmed conference panels:

Keynote Presentation: Unity in Defense of Higher Education and Collective Bargaining with Randi Weingarten, President, American Federation of Teachers, Lynn Pasquerella, President, American Association of Colleges and Universities, and Adrienne Lu, Senior Reporter, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Moderator.

Plenary: Five Years after George Floyd: A New Era for DEI in Higher Education with Nancy Cantor, President, Hunter College, CUNY, Robert J. Jones, Chancellor, The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Charles Toombs, President, California Faculty Association, Taiese Bingham-Hickman, Executive Director, The Leadership Alliance, Brown University, and Adrianna J. Kezar, Professor, Higher Education and Director, Pullias Center for Higher Education, University of Southern California, Moderator.

Research Panel: 2024 Directory of Faculty Contracts and Bargaining Agents in Higher Education with Jacob Apkarian, Associate Professor, Sociology, York College, CUNY, Joseph van der Naald, PhD Candidate in Sociology, Graduate Center, CUNY, Susan Kelly, President, Microsearch Corporation, Mary Taber, Director of Research, UUP, Commentator, Dana Fleming, Associate General Counsel, Tufts University, Commentator, and Malini Cadambi-Daniel, Executive Director, Professional Staff Congress-CUNY, AFT Local 2334, Moderator.

Panel: Loper Bright, Labor Rights, and the Attack on the Administrative State with Diana Reddy, Assistant Professor of Law, Faculty Co-Director, Center for Law and Work, UC Berkeley Law, Seth D. Harris, Distinguished Professor of Practice, Doctoral Program in Law & Policy and Affiliated Faculty and Senior Fellow, Burnes Center for Social Change, Northeastern University, David Lopez, University Professor of Law, Professor Alfred Slocum Scholar, and Co-Dean Emeritus, Rutgers University, and Deepa Das Acevado, Associate Professor of Law, Emory University Law School, Moderator.

Panel: Artificial Intelligence: Changing the Bargaining Landscape with Jeffrey M. Hirsch, Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Geneva Yeargan Rand Distinguished Professor of Law, University of North Carolina School of Law, Kyle Arnone, Director, AFT Collective Bargaining, Nicholas L. Collins, ArentFox Schiff LLP, and Arthur Pearlstein, Arbitrator and Mediator, Moderator.

Panel: Current Immigration Issues in Higher Education with Channing Cooper, Deputy Director, AFT Legal Department, Miriam Feldblum, co-founder and Executive Director, Presidents Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, Cianna Freeman-Tolbert, Whiteman Osterman & Hanna LLP, and Cynthia Carvajal, Director of Undocumented and Immigrant Student Programs, CUNY Student Affairs, Moderator.

Panel: Collective Bargaining and Labor Relations: Looking Back, Looking Forward with Carl Levine, Levy Ratner, Peter A. Jones, Bond, Schoeneck & King PLLC, Faye Moore, Director of Contract Administration, Professional Staff Congress, CUNY, AFT Local 2334, Thomas H. Riley, Jr., Executive Director of Labor and Special Counsel, University of Illinois System, and Theodore H. Curry, Associate Provost and Associate Vice President for Academic Human Resources Emeritus, Professor Emeritus, School of Human Resources and Labor Relations, Michigan State University, Moderator.

Book Discussion: Organizing Professionals: Academic Employees Negotiating a New Academy (Rutgers University Press, 2025) by Gary Rhoades Professor and Director, Center for the Study of Higher Education, University of Arizona wotj Richard Gomes, Staff Representative, AFT New Jersey, Jennie Shanker, Staff Representative, AFT New Jersey, Laura Murphy, Dutchess Community College, Dan Echikson, Organizer, ACT-UAW Local 7902, and Ryan Quinn, Reporter, Inside Higher Ed, Moderator.

Workshop: The Fundamentals for Labor-Management Committees in Higher Education with Stephanie Burkes, Program Associates for Labor Management Services, NYS-CSEA Partnership, Daniel Shook, Program Associates for Labor Management Services, NYS-CSEA Partnership, NYS Office of Employee Relations, Phyllis Volpe, Assistant Director, Contract Negotiations and Administration Unit, New York State Office of Employee Relations, and Liesl K. Zwicklbauer, Associate Vice Chancellor and Chief Counsel for Employee Relations, Moderator.

Panel: “We Have a First contract – Now What?” with Katherine H. Hansen, Gladstein, Reif & Meginniss, LLP, John H. Gross, Ingerman Smith LLP, John Coverdale, Arbitrator, Ahsan Ali, Senior Director of Labor Relations, Tufts University, Sean Collins, SEIU Local 200United/Troy Area Labor Council, AFL-CIO, and Katie Rosen, Arbitrator & Mediator, Moderator.



Panel: New Developments, Old Problems for Contingent Faculty with Elizabethada Wright, Professor, University of Minnesota Duluth, and Contract Administrator, UEA, Rebecca Ropers, Executive Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, University of Minnesota Duluth, Gretchen L. McNamara, President, Ohio Conference of AAUP, Commentator, Randa B. Wahbe, Vice President, Community College Association (CTA/NEA), Commentator, and Christina Gallup, Associate Professor, University of Minnesota Duluth.

Panel: Antiracism and Social Justice Issues and Working Conditions as Negotiable Subjects with Sharon Elise, Professor of Sociology, California State University, San Marcos and Associative Vice President, Council for Racial and Social Justice, California Faculty Association, Donna Murch, Associate Professor of History, Rutgers University-New Brunswick, Region 4 AAUP National Council Member and former Chapter President of the New Brunswick chapter of the Rutgers AAUP AFT, Kathy Sheffield, Director of Representation and Bargaining, California Faculty Association, Karen R. Stubaus, Affiliated Researcher and Visiting Scholar, National Center, and Vice President for Academic Affairs Emerita, Rutgers University, and Margarita Berta Avila, Professor of Education, Sacramento State University and Vice President, California Faculty Association, Moderator.

Panel: Administrator Responses to Campus Protest: Lessons from History

with Ellen Schrecker, Professor of History (retired), Yeshiva University, member AAUP Committee A on Academic Freedom and Tenure, Paul Ortiz, Professor of Labor History, Cornell ILR, Jelani Favors, Henry E. Frye Distinguished Professor, Department of History and Political Science and Director, Center of Excellence for Social Justice, North Carolina A&T State University, and Dale Kapla, Senior Associate Provost, Northern Michigan University, Moderator.

Panel: The Uses and Abuses of Title VI with Rana Jaleel, Associate Professor, Gender, Sexuality, & Women's Studies and Asian American Studies, University of California-Davis, Chair, Committee A on Academic Freedom and Tenure, AAUP, Risa Lieberwitz, Professor of Labor and Employment Law, Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations, Frederick P. Schaffer, former General Counsel, CUNY, and Suzanne B. Goldberg, Herbert and Doris Wechsler Clinical Professor of Law, and Director, Center for Gender & Sexuality Law & Sexuality and Gender Law Clinic, Columbia University Law School, Moderator.

Panel: Annual Legal Update (CLE) with Damien DiGiovanni, Morgan, Brown & Joy, LLP, Amy L. Rosenberger, Willig, Williams & Davidson, Aaron Nisenson, Senior Legal Counsel, AAUP, Brian Selchick, Cullen and Dykman LLP, and Ayanna T. Blake, Director Labor Relations, Weill Cornell Medicine, Moderator.

Facilitated Workshop: Mindfulness as Both a Life Skill and a Negotiator's Asset with Lili Palacios-Baldwin, Deputy General Counsel, Tufts University and Joshua Wright, Lecturer, Department of Psychology, The City College of New York.

Panel: A New Approach to Interest-Based Bargaining in the State of Florida: Successful Bargaining in Challenging Times with Eric Scarffe, President UFF-FIU, Assistant Professor of Philosophy, Florida International University, Daniel Saunders, Chief Negotiator UFF-FIU, Associate Professor of Higher Education, Florida International University, Heather Russell, Vice Provost, Faculty Leadership and Success, Florida International University, Barbara Manzano, Chief Negotiator, Associate Vice President, Academic Affairs, Florida International University, and Andrea Cancer, Commissioner and Todd Austin, Commissioner, Federal Mediation and Conciliation Services, Co-Moderators.

Research Panel: Work Stoppage Across the Educational Continuum: K-12 to Higher Education with Jacob Apkarian, Associate Professor, Sociology, York College, CUNY and National Center Affiliated Researcher, Melissa Arnold Lyon, Assistant Professor of Public Policy Rockefeller College of Public Affairs and Policy, University at Albany, SUNY, Daniel Iskhakov, National Center Graduate Research Fellow, and Rhiannon M. Maton, Associate Professor, Foundations and Social Advocacy, SUNY Cortland and National Center Visiting Scholar, Panelist and Moderator.

Panel: Faculty Members’ Perceptions of the Impact of Unionization on Shared Governance with Brian Rossman, Associate Professor, Open Educational Resources (OER) and Scholarly Communication Librarian, Montana State University Library, Bozeman, Ernesto Longa, Professor of Law, The University of New Mexico School of Law, Commentator, Catherine Bond Hill, Managing Director, Ithaka S+R, and former President, Vassar College, Commentator, and Rotua Lumbantobing, Vice President, AAUP, Moderator.

Panel: Beyond the Table: Best Practices for Collaboration in the Implementation of Collective Bargaining Agreements with Kim C. O’Halloran, Ph.D., Vice President for Academic Planning & Administration, University Academic Affairs, Rutgers University, Heather Pierce, Ph.D., Lecturer, Political Science, Contract Enforcement Chair, PTLFC-AAUP-AFT, Local 6324, Rutgers University, Kamil Robakiewicz, Senior Labor Relations Representative, College of Literature, Science and Arts, University of Michigan, Kirsten Herold, President, LEO, AFT-MI Local 6244, and Scott M. Sommer, Commissioner, Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, Moderator.

Panel: Empowering Classified Staff: Advancing Equity and Mindfulness in Higher Education through Collective Bargaining with Anel Gonzalez, President, CCE/Local4522, Anthony Solis, CFT Field Representative, Lead Negotiator,

Carmelino Cruz, CCE Negotiator and Steward, Anna Pedroza, Vice President Human Resources, and John Rose, Dean, Diversity and Compliance, Hunter College, CUNY, Moderator.

Panel: Lessons from Negotiating: Selection of Bargaining Team Members and Dealing with Rogue Bargaining Team Members with Terry Calaway, Ed.D., President Emeritus, Johnson County Community College and Professor of Practice, Community College Leadership, Kansas State University, Andre’ L. Poplar, J.D., Vice Chancellor for Human Resources, Oakland Community College, Martin Balinsky, Ph.D., Professor, Tallahassee State College, President, United Faculty of Florida-Tallahassee State College and Vice-President, College Bargaining Council, and Deborah H. Williams, J.D., Ph.D., Professor and Chair, Johnson County Community College, former JCCC Faculty Association President and Lead Negotiator, Moderator.

Panel: Demographics and the Doctorate: Predictors of Graduate Student Organizing at Research Universities with Lauren McGuire, M.P.P., Ph.D. Student, Educational Leadership, Policy, & Human Development, College of Education, North Carolina State University, Alissa G. Karl, Statewide Vice President for Academics, UUP, Commentator, Trent McDonald, Staff Organizer, Rutgers AAUP-AFT, Commentator, Marcelle Grair, Chief of Staff, SEIU Local 509, Commentator, and Alexandra (Sascha) Matish, Associate Vice Provost for Academic and Faculty Affairs and Senior Director, Academic Human Resources, University of Michigan, Moderator.

Panel: Graduate Unions as a Training Ground for Higher Education Collective Bargaining with Sikander Khare, UF-GAU Bargaining Chair, Cassandra “Cassie” Urbenz, UF-GAU Co-President, Lane Demaske, URI-GAU Grievance Chair, Danielle Dirocco, Higher Education Organizational Specialist, National Education Association, and Kate Birdsall, Director of Faculty and Academic Staff Affairs, Michigan State University, Moderator.

Panel: Sexual Harassment Adjudication in Graduate Student Employee Contracts with Tamiko Strickman, Special Advisor to the President and Executive Director, Equity, Civil Rights and Title IX Office, University of Michigan, Courtney Bither, Servicing Representative, UAW Region 9A, Emily Weintraut, Teaching Assistant, UC Davis, Karen Stubaus, Affiliated Researcher and Visiting Scholar, National Center, and Vice President for Academic Affairs Emerita, Rutgers University, and Melissa Sortman, Assistant Provost for Faculty and Academic Staff Affairs, Michigan State University, Moderator.

Panel: The New Wave of Campus Student Workers: The Historic Unionization of CSU Student Assistants with Joseph Jelincic, Assistant Vice Chancellor for Collective Bargaining, The California State University, Christina Checel, Associate Vice Chancellor for Labor and Employee Relations, The California State University, Jim Philliou, Executive Director, California State University Employees Union, SEIU Local 2579, Catherine Hutchinson, Statewide President, California State University Employees Union, SEIU Local 2579, Kaily Brooks, Student Leader, CSUEU San Diego State University, and J. Felix De La Torre, General Counsel, California Public Employment Relations Board, Moderator.



Panel: Negotiating over Tenure Procedures with Joseph P. McConnell, Morgan, Brown & Joy, LLP, Jennifer Proffitt, Theodore Clevenger Professor in Communication, Co-Chief Negotiator, UFF-FSU, Florida State University, Herman A. Berliner, Provost Emeritus and University Service Distinguished Professor, Professor of Economics, Hofstra University, Maria Hegbloom, Field Representative Organizer, Massachusetts Teachers Association, and Timothy Connick, Chairperson, New York State Public Employment Relations Board, Moderator.

Panel: Funding of Higher Education over the Next Decade with Thomas L. Harnisch, Vice President for Government Relations, State Higher Education Executive Officers Association (SHEEO), Kenneth E. Redd, Senior Director, Research and Policy Analysis, NACUBO, Matt Richmond, Education Finance Consultant, New America, and Frederick G. Floss, Professor, and Co-Director, Center for Economic Education, Buffalo State University, Panelist and Moderator.

52nd Annual National Conference Sponsors

Order Your Commemorative 52nd Annual Conference T-Shirt

Celebrate the 52nd Annual National Conference and show your support for our research and mission by purchasing the limited edition 52nd Annual Conference t-shirt. The shirts are USA made, printed in a union shop, and 100% cotton.

T-shirts can be pre-ordered in advance of the conference and picked up during the event at the CUNY Graduate Center on Monday-Tuesday, March 24-25, 2025. Please note that the pre-ordered t-shirts will not be available for pick-up on Sunday, March 23rd at Roosevelt House.

To order your t-shirt, click here. Direct any questions to: msavares@hunter.cuny.edu

Represented Interns and Residents at Higher Ed Affiliated Hospitals

Last year’s annual conference featured a panel discussion on collective negotiations involving interns, residents, and fellows at state medical centers and hospitals. The panel included Banks Evans and Cindy Hamra from the University of Washington, Wade Baughman from the University of Michigan, David Dashefsky from the Committee of Interns and Residents-SEIU, and Michael Kelly from Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School with Professor Sara Slinn of Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, moderating.

The breadth of the issues examined during the panel encouraged the National Center to begin collecting nationwide data on collective bargaining relationships involving interns, residents, and fellows employed at public and private university-affiliated hospitals and medical centers. In our monthly newsletters, we began reporting on new representation petitions and certifications involving those titles.

This research builds upon the 2024 panel discussion and reflects our effort to broaden our research and programming to include all campus workers, as well as professional employees in other industries. In expanding our focus to include interns, residents, and fellows, we are cognizant of the interrelationship between their legal efforts to establish employee status under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) and similar initiatives by graduate student employees.

The decision in Boston Medical Center, 330 NLRB 152 (1999), which found that interns and residents were employees for the purposes of collective bargaining under the NLRA, was an important precedent relied upon by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) when it reached a similar conclusion regarding graduate and undergraduate student employees. See, Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York, 364 NLRB 9 (2016).

In developing our dataset, we employed a multi-step methodology. Initially, we collected information about collective bargaining relationships and contracts from the website of the Committee of Interns and Residents-Service Employees International Union (CIR/SEIU), the dominant union in the organizing and representation of interns and residents. 

Following that, we filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the NLRB seeking data on certified bargaining units and pending cases involving interns and residents. After searching online for additional units to expand the initial CIR/SEIU dataset, we cross-referenced our findings with the list of known units provided by the NLRB, allowing us to identify any discrepancies. 

The approximate number of interns and residents listed for each unit in Tables 1 and 2 was obtained from Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) data for the 2023–2024 year. For the unit at Icahn School of Medicine at Mt. Sinai-Elmhurst we used the number of eligible voters in the 2013 representation election conducted by NLRB. The linked contracts were sourced from the websites of CIR-SEIU and other unions.

The two tables below set forth the data we gathered on collective bargaining relationships between unions representing interns, residents, and fellows and university-affiliated hospitals and medical centers; collective bargaining relationships at other hospitals are excluded. 

Table 1 lists 27 collective bargaining relationships with current or recent contracts and includes the institution, state, national bargaining agent affiliation, unit composition, and size, along with a link to the current or recent contract. Table 1 reveals that there are 19,275 unionized interns and residents at university-affiliated medical centers and hospitals, with CIR-SEIU representing 81.4% (22) of the 27 bargaining units. Table 2 sets forth similar information for eleven recently certified collective bargaining relationships without a first contract including the certification’s month and year. The total number of represented interns and residents in Table 2 is 6,330.

The rightmost column of Table 1 contains links to each collective bargaining agreement. The contracts linked in Table 1 were created by higher education institutions and unions, which we downloaded directly from those websites. The National Center is committed to ensuring digital accessibility for people with disabilities. Upon request, the National Center will provide a fully remediated version of an agreement linked in Table 1. Such requests can be made via email to Administrator Michelle Savarese at msavares@hunter.cuny.edu.

Table 1: Collective Bargaining Relationships with Current or Recent Contracts

* = Private Institution. Title abbreviations: HSO = Housestaff Officers, Intrn = Intern, Res = Resident, Cres = Chief Resident. Bargaining agent national affiliation abbreviations: Committee of Interns and Residents-Service Employees International Union (CIR-SEIU); American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) and American Federation of Teachers (AFT). IND = Independent union.

± The specific unit size for each campus at Rutgers, State University of New Jersey (NJ) campuses could not be determined from Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME). Therefore, in Table 1 we have divided the ACGME data evenly for each campus.

Table 2: Collective Bargaining Relationships without a Ratified First Contract

* = Private Institution. Title abbreviations: HSO = Housestaff Officers, Intrn = Intern, Res=Resident, Cres = Chief Resident. Bargaining agent national affiliation abbreviations: Committee of Interns and Residents-Service Employees International Union (CIR-SEIU); the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) and American Federation of Teachers (AFT).

Union Representation at Private Institutions Under State Law?

Higher education labor law history demonstrates that private non-profit higher education institutions began advocating for the NLRB to assert jurisdiction over questions of representation to avoid the application of the more liberal New York State collective bargaining law, which had been amended in 1968 to cover higher education. See, William A. Herbert, The History Books Tell It: Collective Bargaining in Higher Education in the 1940s, Journal of Collective Bargaining in the Academy (2017).

Institutional legal advocacy led to the NLRB asserting jurisdiction over non-profit higher education institutions in Cornell University, 183 NLRB 329 (1970) in representation cases filed by Cornell University and Syracuse University. With rare exception, the NLRB's 1970 Cornell University decision has preempted the application of state collective bargaining laws to private non-profit higher education institutions.

Recent events including the unprecedented termination of NLRB Board member Gwynne Wilcox, the pending constitutional challenges to the NLRB's structure and remedies, and the general attack on the federal administrative state, raises the question of whether the National Labor Relations Act will remain legally enforceable in the years ahead.

This possibility should lead state policymakers, labor law scholars, and advocates to become familiarized with existing state constitutional provisions and collective bargaining laws that are applicable to private employment, which might become far more relevant in the near future. There is already existing precedent permitting representation issues involving faculty at a religiously-affiliated high school to be resolved under a state collective bargaining law.

The existence of a state collective bargaining law does not guarantee, however, that it is applicable to private non-profit higher education institutions. In Rhode Island, legislation was recently introduced to amend that state's private sector law to grant collective bargaining rights to graduate student employees.

Below is a preliminary list of, and links to, existing state constitutional provisions and statutes applicable to private employment, which may no longer be preempted if the NLRA becomes unenforceable or if the NLRB declines jurisdiction over particular questions of representation:

• Connecticut
• Florida
• Hawaii
• Illinois Constitution, Article 1, Section 25
• Illinois
• Massachusetts
• Minnesota
• Missouri Constitution, Article 1, Section 29
• New Jersey Constitution, Article 1, Section 19
• New Jersey
• New York State Constitution, Article 1, Section 17
• New York
• Pennsylvania
• Rhode Island
• South Dakota
• Vermont
• Wisconsin
• Puerto Rico

Download the National Center's Study on Anti-Discrimination Clauses in Higher Education Collective Bargaining Agreements

In November, the National Center released a study titled Anti-Discrimination Clauses in Higher Education Collective Bargaining Agreements. 

Download the study here.

The study is based on research that led to the publication in September of our 2024 Directory of Bargaining Agents and Contracts in Higher Education.



The purpose of the study is to assist negotiators, labor representatives, and administrators in developing, amending, and implementing anti-bias contract provisions.

The study includes excerpted anti-discrimination text from 30 collective bargaining agreements negotiated by different nationally-affiliated unions and institutions at all levels of higher education from across the country involving tenured and tenure track faculty, non-tenure track faculty, postdoctoral scholars and academic researchers, and graduate student employees.

For each contract, the monograph includes the contract's anti-discrimination clause and the relevant negotiated procedure concerning enforcement when the contract does not permit, limits, or modifies the use of the standard grievance-arbitration procedure to enforce the anti-discrimination clause. In addition, the monograph includes a hyperlink to each contract to permit the contextualization of the excerpted provisions within the terms of the entire agreement.

KEY FINDINGS



• While most anti-discrimination clauses explicitly prohibit discrimination based on race, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, age, disability, and union activity, there are wide differences with respect to other protected categories.

• Over the course of time, anti-discrimination clauses have changed, reflecting the historical context during which they were negotiated. Examples of those changes over the years are prohibitions against discrimination based on civil union status, HIV status, and Vietnam-era veteran status.

• Recent contract clauses have expanded protections against discrimination to include caste; citizenship status; immigration status; ancestry; marital or parental status; status as a victim of domestic violence, sexual assault or stalking; gender expression; gender identity; genetic information; height; weight; arrest record; military status; veteran status; or unfavorably discharged from military service. Only one contract has an anti-discrimination clause limited to prohibiting discrimination based on union activity.

• Certain contracts expand upon sex as a protected category to explicitly address sexual harassment and sexual misconduct, as well as faculty-student relationships. The most detailed definitions of sexual harassment, with special procedures for investigating and remedying sexual harassment complaints under Title IX and anti-discrimination clauses, are in contracts involving postdoctoral scholars and graduate student employees.

• A significant difference among the contracts is the agreed-upon means of enforcement. Some contracts permit discrimination claims to be processed under the regular grievance-arbitration procedure. Others modify those procedures for handling discrimination issues and some agreements exclude alleged violations of the anti-discrimination clause from the grievance process. Lastly, some parties have opted to condition the arbitration of a discrimination grievance on the employee waiving her or his rights to pursue statutory discrimination claims in court or other external forums.

Download the National Center's 2024 Directory of Bargaining Agents and

Contracts in Institutions of Higher Education

In September, the National Center published our 2024 Directory of Bargaining Agents and Contracts in institutions of Higher Education on the scope of higher education unionization involving faculty, postdoctoral scholars, and graduate and undergraduate student employees.

The 2024 Directory includes data and analysis concerning over 900 collective bargaining relationships in higher education through January 1, 2024, and hyperlinks to 813 recent contracts in higher education. Click here to download 2024 Directory

KEY RESEARCH FINDINGS



• The faculty union representation rate was 27% as of January 1, 2024, with a total of 402,217 unionized faculty across 29 states and the District of Columbia;
• California, New York, and New Jersey have the highest number of unionized faculty;
• The total number of unionized faculty grew by 7.5% since 2012;
• Represented faculty at the private non-profit institutions grew by 56%, relative to a 4% growth in the public sector, since 2012;
• As of January 1, 2024, there were 10 bargaining units of exclusively postdoctoral scholars with a total of 11,471 employees and two academic research units with a total of 6,132 employees.
• The graduate student employee union representation rate was 38% at the beginning of 2024 with over 150,000 employees in 81 bargaining units;
• Graduate student representation increased by 133% since 2012 with 60% of that growth at private non-profit higher education institutions;
• As of January 1, 2024, there were 19 exclusively undergraduate student employee units, with a total of 3,515 represented employees.

Clark University: Teamsters File to Represent Student Workers

Clark University, Case No. 01-RC-360306

On February 14, 2025, the Teamsters filed a petition with the National Labor Relations Board seeking to represent a bargaining unit of 620 graduate and undergraduate student workers at Clark University. The filing has the potential for providing a new NLRB Board majority with the opportunity to revisit the employee status of student workers in

higher education decided in Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York, 364 NLRB 9 (2016).

The following is the description of the proposed bargaining unit in the Teamsters petition:

Included: All full-time and part-time undergraduate and graduate students who are enrolled in degree programs at and employed by Clark University, including but not limited to: Teaching Assistants, Research Assistants, Graduate Assistants, Fellows, Lab Assistants, Tutors, Peer Mentors, Peer Learning Assistants, Course Assistants, Learning Partners, Proctors, Training Coordinators, All Other Assistants (e.g., Stockroom Assistants, Office Assistants, Facilities Assistants, Library Assistants, Resource Library Assistants, Front Desk Assistants, Costume Assistants), Clerks (e.g., General Accounting Clerks), Ambassadors (e.g., Student, Campus, Admissions), Student Alumni Callers, Fundraising Representatives, Lifeguards, Fitness Instructors, Equipment Staff, Laundry Staff, Grounds Crew, Community Engagement and Volunteering Workers, Web Developers, IT Technicians, ITS Technicians, Systems Admin. Staff, Event Committee Planners, Food Pantry Staff, SLP Technicians, Ushers, Game Day Staff, Thrift Store Staff, and Resident Advisors (RAs).

Excluded: All guards, supervisors and professional employees, as defined by the Act.

Macalester College: Undergraduate Student Workers Election

Macalester College, NLRB Case No: 18-RC-355544

On December 10, 2024, NLRB Region 18 issued a notice of election concerning a representation petition filed by Macalester Undergraduate Workers Union (MUWU) seeking to represent a unit of 1300 undergraduate employees at Macalester College. The notice scheduled the election to take place on February 25 and 26, 2025.

Like the representation petition at Clark University, the case at Macalester College has the potential for providing a new NLRB Board majority with the opportunity to revisit the employee status of student workers in higher education decided in Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York, 364 NLRB 9 (2016).

The following is the voting unit identified in the notice of election at Macalester College:

Included: All student workers who are (1) enrolled as undergraduate students at Macalester College and (2) employed by Macalester College as full-time or regular part-time employees who were employed by the Employer during the payroll period ending February 8, 2025.

Also eligible to vote are all employees in the unit who were employed during the Fall semester of 2024 and who averaged a minimum of 4 hours per week of work during their employment in the Fall semester of 2024.

Excluded: All students (1) in an entirely externally grant-funded position; (2) who were formerly, but are no longer, enrolled as undergraduate students at Macalester College; (3) who were formerly, but are no longer, non-exempt hourly employees of the Employer; (4) who solely work off-campus and are paid by Macalester for that work; (5) who are non-employees of Macalester College; and (6) guards and supervisors as defined by the Act, as amended, and all other employees.

The parties agreed that students who work on-campus and are compensated by stipend may vote in the election, but their ballots will be challenged since their eligibility has not been resolved. No decision has been made regarding whether the individuals in these classifications or groups are included in, or excluded from, the bargaining unit. The eligibility or inclusion of these individuals will be resolved, if necessary, following the election.

University of Vermont: Court Sets Aside Administrative Finding that Predoctoral Fellows and Trainees Are Employees

In Re United Auto Workers, Local 2322, Vermont Supreme Court, Case No. 24-AP-129

On February 21, 2024, the Vermont Supreme Court issued a decision reversing a decision by the Vermont Labor Relations Board (VLRB) that predoctoral fellows and trainees were employees for purposes of collective bargaining under Vermont's public sector labor law. The decision did not disturb VLRB's finding that the 1700 graduate assistants at the university were employees and entitled to union representation.

In reversing the VLRB's decision, the court found that the agency had failed to make any findings to support its conclusion that the 57predoctoral fellows and trainees worked for the university. As a result, the representation case concerning predoctoral fellows and trainees was returned to VLRB for additional factual findings and analysis about their employee status.

Books by 2025 Conference Panelists

On Sunday, March 23, 2025 Gary Rhoades, Professor and Director, Center for the Study of Higher Education, University of Arizona and author of Organizing Professionals: Academic Employees Negotiating a New Academy Rutgers University Press (2025) will present on his new book and there will be a book signing following the presentation.

On Monday, March 25, 2025 Jelani Favors, Henry E. Frye Distinguished Professor, Department of History and Political Science and Director, Center of Excellence for Social Justice, North Carolina A&T State University will be discussing his book Shelter in a Time of Storm: How Black Colleges Fostered Generations of Leadership and Activism, UNC Press (2019).

On Monday, March 24, 2025 Deepa Das Acevedo, Professor at Emory University School of Law and author of the new book The War on Tenure, will moderate a panel titled Loper Bright, Labor Rights, and the Attack on the Administrative State at the CUNY Graduate Center as part the National Center's annual conference. .On Tuesday, March 25, 2025, she will be participating in a forum titled Academic Freedom and Freedom of Speech: What Does it Mean for the Hunter Community? at Hunter College's Roosevelt House. The forum will take place from 2:00-4:00 pm ET.

New Book on Labor Union Responses to Sexual Harassment

Submit Articles to the Journal of Collective Bargaining in the Academy

The Journal of Collective Bargaining in the Academy is a publication of the National Center for the Study of Collective Bargaining in Higher Education and the Professions. It is an open-access, peer-reviewed, online periodical advancing research and scholarly thought related to collective bargaining in higher education, and making relevant and pragmatic peer-reviewed research readily accessible.

The Journal is now accepting submissions for Volume 16 to be published in March 2025. Our authors customarily include college and university faculty and administrators, scholars, graduate students, union activists and leaders, and others interested in collective bargaining in higher education.

Our Journal editors are particularly interested in submissions for Volume 16 dealing with the following subjects: artificial intelligence and collective bargaining; social justice issues as negotiable subjects; Title IX compliance in the context of legal challenges; graduate and undergraduate student unionization and bargaining; ombudsperson offices co-existing or conflicting with academic labor; and other important issues in today’s fast-changing and growing campus collective bargaining world.

Please see the Aims & Scope page for more information or contact the editors with any questions on possible submissions.

Journal editors are Gary Rhoades, University of Arizona, Karen Stubaus, National Center Visiting Scholar and former Vice President for Academic Affairs at Rutgers University, and Jacob Apkarian, York College, City University of New York. It is supported in part by a generous contribution from TIAA and is hosted by the institutional repository of Eastern Illinois University, The Keep, a service of EIU's Booth Library.

Volume 15 of the Journal, which was published earlier this year, was titled "Learning From and Building on Collective Bargaining's Foundations and Experience." Below are links to articles that appeared in that volume:

Op-Ed

Collective Bargaining Among Undergraduate Students by Daniel J. Julius and Nicholas DiGiovanni Jr.

Articles

The Persistence of Separate and Unequal: Debunking Myths of the Market in Bargaining for Faculty Gender Salary Equity by Johanna E. Foster and Jen McGovern

The Role of the Chief Negotiator in Academic Collective Bargaining by Nicholas DiGiovanni Jr.

The 50 Year History of Collective Bargaining at Hofstra University by Herman A. Berliner, Peter C. Daniel, Bernard J. Firestone, Estelle S. Gellman, Elizabeth J. Ploran, and Liora P. Schmelkin

Analyzing the Upward Trend in Academic Unionization: Drivers and Influences

by Andrea Clemons

Practitioner Perspectives

TAUP's 50-Year Collective Bargaining Story by Arthur Hochner

Some Thoughts of Faculty Strikes by Margaret E. Winters and William Connellan