With the strike deadline of March 6 nearing, the SENS-UAW union has asked The New School’s students, employees, faculty, and parents to show solidarity.
The academic student workers’ union, SENS-UAW, will strike Wednesday if tentative agreements are not made on their contract with The New School.
In a community-wide update from SENS-UAW, the union asked faculty members not to scab — or work the jobs of those who are striking. They also ask faculty not to cross the physical or virtual picket lines, or do any work on New School property or servers, such as hosting class or using Canvas.
If the union initiates a strike, classes taught by Teaching Assistants (TAs) and Teaching Fellows (TFs), would stop. Any tutoring sessions and work done by Research Associates and Assistants (RAs) will also cease.
In addition, student workers who are not represented by SENS-UAW have been asked to stop work in solidarity. The New Student Workers’ Union (NewSWU) has also pledged to strike in solidarity.
Resident Assistants, many of whom are members of NewSWU, have said they will cease all work with student housing in solidarity with SENS, except for emergencies residents may have.
The National Labor Relations Act protects “concerted activity” by workers, which means non-academic student workers, including international student workers, cannot be retaliated against by their employer for collective action.
SENS union representative Josephine D. Baker said in a “Strike School” event held by the union Monday, “It’s being in solidarity that makes us strong. It’s being in solidarity that protects us.”
However, Part-Time Faculty (PTF) are unable to strike in solidarity with their fellow UAW members, according to Article XXVII of the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) from Dec. 2022.
Similar to the PTF strike in fall 2022, full-time faculty members have discretion about whether they will strike in solidarity or continue work during the strike.
SENS-UAW has released an FAQ page detailing the solidarity requests for different members of the New School community. In the document, SENS asks that full-time faculty members not “cross physical or virtual picket lines.” By this, the union means to avoid using university facilities or online resources, such as Canvas, Starfish, or their university email accounts.
In addition, students must decide on a class-by-class basis whether to meet or abstain from engaging in university activities.
The union is requesting that faculty and students work together to decide action plans for their classes. In a statement regarding the potential strike, the University Student Senate said that it is limited in providing guidance to students. It continued that students with questions and concerns should communicate with classmates and instructors to reach a clear plan of action.
At a recent union education event, student academic workers urged others to support the strike.
“We need everyone on the picket line. Students with TAs or TFs teaching their classes can say they will not be attending,” SENS representative Baker said.
“Students can ask full-time faculty to cancel their classes, or otherwise move them either online or off-campus, so we can really shut it down,” she added.
For the duration of the strike, SENS members will partake in picketing outside university buildings. Members who actively participate in striking, whether through picketing, communication, clerical, or other logistic work, will qualify for compensation from the UAW strike fund. Compensation for members will be $100 per day of active strike duties.
Meanwhile, TNS Human Resources Vice President Sonya Williams said that the university’s March 4 offer contains wage increases of $2.75 to $6.65 per hour in the contract’s first year as well as full-tuition waivers for Ph.D. students who are working. “We do not believe that a strike is necessary given the progress we have made at the last few bargaining sessions,” Williams said in a university-wide message Monday.
But union members said that the session did not include any movement on their articles for international student worker support, childcare, healthcare, or gender-affirming and reproductive care protections.