Campaign Updates

Yesterday, graduate workers met with Penn admin for our sixth bargaining session. The petition signed by over 1,300 graduate workers made an impact. Grad workers also put pressure on the admin team by packing the bargaining room and delivering powerful testimonials on...

Yesterday, graduate workers met with Penn admin for our fifth bargaining session. While we pushed the administration to make progress on a few issues, we were disappointed yet again by management’s lack of engagement with a large number of our proposals. Here’s what...

Yesterday, grad workers met with Penn admin for our fourth bargaining session. For three sessions in a row — over one month — admin has failed to respond at all to 12 of the non-economic proposals we have presented so far. When asked when we can expect responses,...

Today, grad workers met with Penn admin for our third bargaining session. We are disappointed that admin failed to provide responses to 16 of the proposals we have given them so far. The University’s bargaining team addressed only two of our non-economic proposals...

Today, grad workers met with Penn admin for our second bargaining session! Based on the pressure we exerted in the last session, we were able to hold today’s negotiations in a larger room with chairs and ample space for observers to sit. We were thrilled to have...

Last week, grad workers met with Penn admin for our first bargaining session! In a show of strength and unity, over 50 graduate worker observers joined the bargaining committee for today’s session to kick off our contract campaign. We’re thrilled that so many...

Welcome back to campus and to the start of the school year! A lot has happened this summer since Penn graduate workers won our union in May. Let’s keep the momentum going.  We’ve made great strides this summer to start negotiating our first union contract with Penn...

We, the undersigned current international graduate students at Penn, are writing to you today to encourage you to vote YES in the upcoming union election on May 1st and 2nd at Houston Hall. More than thirty percent of graduate students at Penn are international,...

The last few days have brought some major news and changes for our upcoming election. The good news is that Educational Fellowship Recipients (EFRs) who are currently working as researchers have won the right to vote in next week’s election! The bad news is that Penn...

Yesterday, two things happened that have had a profound effect on our union election proceedings. First, graduate workers won our appeal against Penn’s attempt to exclude Educational Fellowship Recipients (EFRs) who do teaching or research from voting in the union...