UPDATE
Student Researchers United-UAW has joined UAW 2865! There is now one union for all UC graduate workers. This website will no longer be updated. To stay up to date, go to uaw2865.org, and make sure to sign a membership card.
About Student Researchers United-UAW
Student Researchers United is composed of students who work in research positions across the University of California. We are forming a union in order to better our working conditions. Student Researchers make critical contributions to world-class research at UC, but many of us lack secure rights and protections in the workplace, struggle to pay high housing and other costs, and face increasing uncertainty about our futures.
Beyond UC, we aim to increase the voice of all researchers in the political process by advocating for increased research funding, fair visa and immigration policies in the US, and safer, more just working environments in all academic institutions.
Student Researchers have witnessed the power of organized Postdocs, Academic Researchers, Teaching Assistants and other Academic Student Employees at UC to dramatically improve their working conditions through unionization with United Auto Workers (UAW). On this website you can learn about some of the victories that academic workers have won after forming their unions with UAW. You will also learn about how, as Student Researchers, we can improve our own working conditions by unionization, and joining the other 80,000 academic workers across the country who have already formed unions with UAW.
“I am a Graduate Student Researcher in Quantitative and Systems Biology at UC-Merced studying immune responses during Valley Fever infection. I believe in unionization because through their union my Teaching Assistant colleagues have won salary increases, health insurance benefits, childcare reimbursement, and numerous other legally-binding, enforceable rights in a union contract. We may be individual voices but together as a majority of Student Researchers we can push for fair representation and make our concerns heard!” – Anh Diep, UC Merced
“I’m Weixian, a graduate student from the Biochemistry, Biophysics and Structural Biology program at UCLA. Forming a Student Researcher union will unite the voices of every member of our big family, and will help deliver our demands and protect our rights. As an international student, we are a vulnerable group of people in the states facing unpredictable policies and executive orders threatening us all the time. I believe, with a strong union, we will be able to improve our life and career development in graduate school, and international students will be better protected.” – Weixian Deng, UCLA
“I am a sixth year Ph.D. candidate in Environmental Sciences. I am also a mother to an infant son and a Latina. Both of these factors make me more likely to flow through what many in academia refer to as “the leaky pipeline.” However, this pipeline is not leaking. It’s unnecessary pressure in the form of racism, sexism, discriminatory practices, and economic uncertainty that force students of untraditional backgrounds out of academia at an alarming rate. Protections for Student Researchers like myself, in the form of a union, can help address systemic issues and provide agreement between the University and the researchers that provide invaluable resources to keep UC moving forward.” – Claudia Christine Avila, UC Riverside
