By TIFFANY CAMHI/Oregon Public Broadcasting
CORVALLIS — After 14 months of contract negotiations, hundreds of OSU’s graduate student employees went on strike Tuesday.
OSU’s Coalition of Graduate Employees represents more than 1,700 graduate teaching and research assistants at the university’s Corvallis campus.
A wide majority of the union’s members voted to authorize a strike two weeks ago. More than 800 CGE members took a further step by signing a strike pledge, said union President Austin Bosgraaf.
“I have seen an unbelievable momentum amongst the graduate workers at this school,” said Bosgraaf. “We are in a really strong place and CGE has done better than it ever has in response to what’s happening.”
Hundreds of CGE members participated in a walkout and picket Tuesday at OSU’s Memorial Union Quad. The graduate workers, many wearing pink shirts with the word “solidarity” on the front, marched along the quad and chanted sayings such as, “We won’t work, we won’t teach, until we can afford to eat.”
This is the first strike in CGE’s 25-year history at OSU.
A spokesperson with OSU said the university is disappointed at the outcome but will continue to be open to additional bargaining sessions in order to reach a sustainable contract with CGE. The university has also given CGE a deadline to accept its most recent offer. OSU’s offer expires at 5 p.m. Tuesday.
The next mediation session between the two parties is scheduled Thursday.
CGE leaders also said the university is trying to remove bargaining power from the union by proposing changes to the contract length. The union wants to keep a status quo four-year contract, with the option to reopen and renegotiate some elements of it after two years. OSU has proposed a four-year contract with no reopener, down from its original six-year proposal.
The strike could have an outsized impact on learning at the university. Many of the union’s members have a hand in teaching undergraduate courses at OSU. Bosgraaf said he has already seen notices of some classes and study groups being canceled in the math department.
A spokesperson with the university said last week that classes will continue, to the greatest extent possible, during the strike.
The union and OSU have been in state mediation for more than a month, including two sessions over the past four days. There has been some movement from both sides but CGE and the university are still far apart on wages and contract length.
CGE is seeking a total 40% salary bump for its lowest-paid members to keep up with the rising cost of housing, food and transportation in the Corvallis area and pandemic-era inflation.
“Our lowest-paid workers are struggling and that is a significant increase to their salaries,” said Brandi Whiteman, vice president of bargaining for CGE. “That would make a really positive impact on their lives.”
Whiteman said the union lowered its wage proposal by five percent in recent negotiation sessions. OSU offered a total 14% salary minimum increase last Friday.
In a statement, the university said it has been bargaining for a contract that honors the work of its graduate students and meets OSU’s obligations to manage its resources appropriately.
“If that is true, then the university has a strange way of showing it,” said CGE member Luke Nearhood about OSU’s comment on graduate student employees. “Fundamentally, this university cannot operate without us. And for too long, the university has taken us for granted.”
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