CGSU

Letter to the Editor: Why STEM graduate students support CGSU

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A union does not limit STEM stipends, but protects them. A union will not negatively impact students who receive the best stipends. Instead, it protects and guarantees increases to the highest stipends, and also increases the minimum. Currently graduate students have no say in minimum stipends and no guarantee that individual stipends will increase from year to year. Summer appointment letters decreased by up to $780 in engineering departments in 2016 compared with 2015. It is unclear how widespread this cut was within the school of engineering since the administration does not inform us of pay cuts, who they affect, or why they occurred.

CGSU

Letter to the Editor: On the essential labor of graduate employees

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To the Editor:

In the March 3, 2017 Graduate School Announcements email’s “Ask a Dean” feature, there was a featured question asking what would happen if graduate employees decided to strike. In her response to this question, Dean of the Graduate School Barbara Knuth, wrote, “Very few undergraduate courses have a graduate assistant as an instructor of record, so it is unlikely that many, if any, classes would stop due to the absence (on strike) of graduate assistants, but such a situation has not occurred before at Cornell so it is hard to predict what the full set of consequences would be.” I write today as a graduate employee teaching a first-year writing seminar, an active participant in shared governance at Cornell and proud supporter and member of Cornell Graduate Students United to affirm the essential labor of graduate employees belittled and erased by Knuth’s response. Even if we follow the scope of Knuth’s response and only focus on teaching assistants, it must be recognized that the labor provided to Cornell University by graduate employees is absolutely essential to its daily functioning and ability to fulfill its educational mission. Full stop. No qualifiers.

News

CGSU Rally Marks ‘Momentous Day’ in Fight Towards Unionization

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Clad in red to show solidarity with CGSU, Cornell graduate students, undergraduates and even members of Ithaca College congregated for the march — a showing that “sends a powerful message to Cornell’s administration,” said Maggie Gustafson grad in a speech at the rally to the cheers of her audience.

CGSU

Cornell Graduate Students United Announce Intention to File for Union Recognition Election

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“Our choice is clear: either we can keep things the way they are — where Cornell is the sole decision-maker with regards to our working conditions — or we can vote ‘yes’ to create a fair and democratic graduate union that will give us a seat at the decision-making table,” said CGSU members Danny Rosenberg Daneri and Jaron Kent-Dobias in an announcement on CGSU’s website.

CGSU

Cornell Graduate Students United and Cornell Organization for Labor Action Stand By Ithaca College in Contingent Faculty Strike

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“We, the members of Cornell Graduate Student Union and Cornell Organization for Labor Action, stand in solidarity with the Ithaca College Contingent Faculty,” the statement read. “We, as current and future workers from Cornell University, remind the Ithaca College Administration that the fundamental role of the university is to critically challenge the status quo, which reserves justice, equality and dignity for a small minority.”