Dec. 16, 2022 Updated: Dec. 17, 2022 2:08 p.m. (SFChronicle.com)
Workers at the University of California reached a tentative agreement Friday night with university officials, potentially ending a five-week strike that canceled an untold number of classes and upended the fall semester, just as final exams loomed. The tentative agreement still needs to be voted on and ratified before the strike officially ends.
“Over the 2.5 years of this contract, workers will see raises of up to 66%, or over $13,000 a year at some campuses,” Tarini Hardikar, a member of the SRU-UAW Bargaining Team at UC Berkeley said. Hardikar added that the tentative contract includes expanded benefits for parent workers, enhanced rights for international workers, and better accommodations for staff with medical or mental health needs, among a myriad of other things.
Nineteen thousand graduate student instructors who walked off the job Nov. 14 on campuses across California said they could barely get by on salaries of $24,000 a year for 20 hours of work a week while they pursue their own studies. Though some departments pay an extra $6,000 to $10,000, many striking workers said they were struggling to afford high rents and had little money for food.
The contract will now go to union members for a ratification vote, set to last from Monday through Friday of next week, according to the release. If approved, the contracts would be effective through May 31, 2025, according the UC President’s Office.
“I want to congratulate the parties for today’s historic agreement,” said Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg, picked to serve as mediator between the two sides during negotiations. “Together, they reached a principled solution to end the difficult impasse. The union fought hard to ensure that the university’s graduate students make a living wage at every campus community. They and the University achieved a new national standard for members.”
The agreement comes four days after postdoctoral scholars and academic researchers returned to all 10 of the University of California System’s campuses, having ratified a five-year agreement last Friday that included pay hikes up to 20%.
“I would like to thank Mayor Steinberg, and negotiators for both the University and the UAW, for coming together in a spirit of compromise to reach this tentative agreement. This is a positive step forward for the University and for our students, and I am grateful for the progress we have made together,” said Michael V. Drake, president of the University of California.
Jordan Parker (he/him) is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: jordan.parker@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @jparkerwrites
Written By Jordan Parker
Jordan Parker is a breaking news reporter at The San Francisco Chronicle. Before joining the newsroom, he spent six semesters on his award-winning college newspaper, the State Hornet, where he won two Associated Collegiate Press awards and led the organization to an Innovation Pacemaker award as editor in chief. Parker is a proud Sacramento State University alum, where he recently earned his bachelors degree in journalism in May 2022. He is originally from Pittsburg, California.VIEW COMMENTS
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