At the bargaining table yesterday:
- ASEs packed the room and resoundingly rejected Wednesday’s supposal from the university.
- ASEs compromised even more on fee remission, offering annual savings of $1M+ by 2024.
- The university offered a slightly modified proposal that, like the previous proposal, has no guaranteed staffing increases, no tuition remission, cuts wages and benefits in half, and makes everyone hourly, which ASEs also rejected.
- With just over a week left to strike a deal, the bargaining process is moving to third-party mediation.
- Friday’s bargaining session is canceled.
ASEs packed the bargaining room yesterday and resoundingly told the university that they oppose Wednesday’s supposal that would cut TAs, cut wages, eliminate remissions, and not guarantee any increases to staffing.
Additionally, ASEs raised concerns over the university’s “sustainable staffing model,” which would decrease TA appointments and increase tutor/reader appointments. ASEs expressed a concern that it would underemphasize discussion and lab sections, where some of the most significant learning occurs.
During the three-hour bargaining session, a few more supposals were passed back and forth.
ASEs passed the university a supposal that compromised even more on tuition remission, offering an estimated $1M+ in annual savings by 2024. In the supposal, ASEs recommended a guaranteed 25% increase in TA appointments over uGSI appointments—a 15% increase to address overwork in the departments and a 10% increase to improve course quality.
The university’s new supposal was essentially similar to its supposal yesterday.
- No guaranteed increases to staffing
- No tuition remission for any undergrad TA, including at 20 hours.
- All undergraduate salaried ASEs, including TAs, become hourly.
- Immediate reduction in total 8-hour TA wages & benefits (including remission) by 53%
- By 2024, wages & benefits for 8-hour TAs will be 76% lower than what is guaranteed by our union contract.
The most significant changes on the university’s side were the following:
- Head TAs would be paid a wage rate 50% higher than that of all other workers, including other TAs working at 20 hours. (Currently, head TAs and other TAs have the same wage rate, but head TAs typically make 2.5x as much as section TAs due to working 2.5x as many hours. This would cause 20-hour head TAs to take home 3.75x as much compared to 8-hour section TAs.)
- The university proposed providing 375 pedagogy courses at no cost to first-time TAs over the summer (matching past practices), approaching a similar provision provided by ASEs in our supposal.
(You can view the supposals, along with the entire history of bargaining, at our bargaining tracker.)
Professor John DeNero also clarified that the university would like the freedom to appoint tutors at 20 hours per week (at their lower wage rate).
After discussion, ASEs rejected the university’s revised supposal because it addressed none of our major concerns. Noting the lack of progress in the negotiations after five weeks, ASEs recommended that the bargaining process move toward mediation.
(Mediation is a process where a neutral third party comes in to propose a fair settlement. Neither side is obligated to accept the settlement. If no agreement on this side letter is reached, we will default to the union contract, which provides for full fee remission for 8-hour uGSIs and 57% raises by 2024.)
ASEs recommended Barry Winograd—a retired Berkeley Law lecturer and the former president of the National Academy of Arbitrators—due to his familiarity with issues in the EECS/DS departments. (Professor John DeNero specifically objected to the use of Winograd as a mediator.) ASEs also floated the idea of seeking Darrell Steinberg, the mayor of Sacramento, as he mediated the conclusion to last year’s UC-wide strike. The university recommended using a mediator provided by the Public Employment Relations Board due to a lower cost. Given that we have just over a week to reach a deal, ASEs pushed back on this idea, noting that it would take too long to bring a PERB mediator up to speed.
In solidarity,
Gabe Classon