TRU-UE Local 197 member, Rachel Williams, writes for the UE New about our fight to win 6th year funding after the university went back on their contractual obligation to work with the union to expand it. Article here.
Author: trujhu_dpmnwm
On May Day, JHU grad workers picketed to demand JHU stand up to the Trump administration to stand up for international workers and researchers across the university whose research has been affected by federal attacks on DEI. Article here.
The Johns Hopkins University graduate student workers’ union filed an unfair labor practice charge to investigate the private Baltimore university less than three months after reaching a contract agreement! Article
We won and ratified our first union contract! WYPR covers it in this article.
You can find the articles here!
- Baltimore Business Journal Article (Subscription Required)
- Baltimore Sun Article
The labor podcast “Working People” interviewed some of our members on the picket line! Listen here:
https://workingpeople.libsyn.com/shut-it-down-on-the-ground-at-johns-hopkins-grad-unions-practice-picket
Johns Hopkins Newsletter interviewed some of our members on the picket line!
One of the lead organizers, Janvi Madhani, explained the purpose of the picket and their disagreements with University administration in an interview with The News-Letter.
“Our members of TRU-UE, which represents over 3,400 graduate workers at Hopkins, are demonstrating for a fair contract,” she said. “We have three demands for this picket. We will not settle for a contract that does not meet the demands of a union shop, the recognition of our work as work and fair compensation in the form of fair wages and benefits.”
WYPR, our local public radio station had some coverage of our recent practice picket!
Wisam Awadallah, a doctoral candidate in Hopkins’ school of medicine, said the point of a practice picket is to show the union is ready to strike.
“For the last nine months, the university has done everything they can to stall and be obstructionist,” Awadallah said. “Our labor provides all the prestige and work that make this university run. We want them to know that without us they can’t be the Johns Hopkins they want to be.”
About a month after our first collective bargaining session, TRU-UE Local 197 members Ali Siddiqui, Kristin Brig-Ortiz, and Andrew Eneim reflect on the history of TRU and the fights and organizing that brought us to winning our union and to the bargaining table. Article here.
Last night, after a meeting with hundreds of grad workers, nominations opened for our new 22-member Bargaining Committee (BC): a team of PhD student workers who will take our proposals for a contract to the university administration and directly negotiate for comprehensive improvements to our working conditions.
But winning a strong contract for ALL grad workers is going to take thousands of grads across JHU to be engaged in the process and putting pressure on university leaders to agree to our demands. That’s why our Bargaining Committee will work in conjunction with the Contract Action Team (CAT), a group of hundreds of grad organizers who will be talking to coworkers, keeping them updated about the process, and mobilizing our union to action.
Ready to join the CAT? You can sign up here! And if you are interested in nominating yourself or a coworker for the BC you can do that here. Nominations will be open until next Tuesday Feb 28.
Here are the key dates in our Bargaining Committee election:
- BC nominations are open from Feb 21 to Feb 28
- Division-level meetings to learn more and meet the candidates will be on Mar 1 and 2
- Electronic voting opens Mar 3 and closes at 11:59 pm on Mar 8
Questions about how this election will work? Check out the BC election FAQs here! If you missed last night’s meeting but want a detailed recap, take a look at this write up. And be on the look-out for our future office hour sessions, where you can talk one-on-one with an organizer more in-depth.
Note that nominations for and voting in the Bargaining Committee election will be open to any union member, so make sure you sign your union card to officially join TRU-UE if you haven’t already.
We are incredibly excited to take this next step as we continue to build a better Hopkins together!