The Graduate Employee Student Organization announced their plans for a union card drive, to be granted collective bargaining rights to create a union Tuesday.
According to members of GESO, Ohio State is not providing adequate working conditions for its graduate students. The card drive will be held to measure graduate employees’ interest in unionizing.
Under Ohio law, the university reserves the right to decide whether or not graduate employees can hold an election to unionize. If administrators agree to the process, a majority vote would be enough to form the union.
The goal of the card drive is to convince administrators at the university that graduate students want to unionize.
Alistair Fraser, a member of the GESO organizing committee, said OSU falls behind most Big Ten schools in graduate employees’ benefits. He pointed out attracting the best graduate students should be a goal of the university.
“There’s a chance we’re going to lose out on graduate students if we’re not offering the best conditions and the best place to come to,” Alistair said.
GESO’s goals include increased stipends, subsidized health care and improved working conditions, including better training for teaching assistants.
Other Big Ten schools with unionized graduate employees include Michigan, Wisconsin, Michigan State and, most recently, Illinois. When compared to OSU, these schools may come out ahead in terms of better wages and health benefits.
Graduate students at OSU start with a stipend averaging $900 a month. Students are also expected to pay their own health care costs, which can range from about $275 for an individual to more than $700 a month for a family plan.
Michael Sylvester, a national representative for the American Federation of Teachers, said graduate employees at Michigan earn almost twice as much in their stipends. Further, employees at Michigan State and Wisconsin receive university-paid health care for themselves and their families.
“There is no reason if other employees can accomplish these things, that graduate employees at Ohio State can’t accomplish these things,” Sylvester said.
The members of GESO agree. Lee Evans, a graduate student in women’s studies, worked for 30 years in various fields before enrolling in the graduate program at OSU. She said OSU students are the lowest paid of all the Big Ten schools.
“That’s no longer acceptable in this type of economy,” Evans said. “What I know for a fact is the more voice people have about their working conditions, the more satisfied they are and the better job they do.”
GESO plans to begin mailing all graduate employees within the next couple of weeks, but has no definite plans for negotiations so far.
“It would be great if, by the end of this year, we had enough signatures to take to the university,” Fraser said.
