Penn students battling clock & administration in fight to unionize

University of Pennsylvania graduate students are battling their administration — and perhaps the clock — in an attempt to unionize.

On Wednesday, lawyers representing graduate student workers and lawyers representing the university met in a hearing before the regional office of the National Labor Relations Board. The meeting's primary purpose was to determine which graduate student works would be eligible for a unionization vote and when that vote would occur.

But union backers see an ulterior motive embedded in the vigor with which the administration is pleading its case.

"I honestly think that every argument they make is geared toward delay," said Emma Teitelman, a doctoral candidate who studies 19th-century labor history.

A University of Pennsylvania representative declined to comment on the university's legal tactics.

There are two vacancies on the NLRB, which decides the types of workers eligible to unionize. In 2016, the NLRB reversed precedent and said graduate student workers at Columbia University could form a bargaining unit.

How President Donald Trump could impact the NLRB vacancies, at Newsworks.org.

 

Source: Philadelphia Business Journal