GEO files a grievance, engages in impact bargaining.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Thursday, February 17th, 2021
Contacts:
Bram Osterhout
GEO Member
bram.osterhout@gmail.com
Owen MacDonald, Angela Ting
Communications Officers
commcomm@uigeo.org
GEO files a grievance, engages in impact bargaining.
Champaign-Urbana, IL - In response to UIUC administration’s unwillingness to take COVID-19 safety concerns among graduate workers seriously, the GEO filed a grievance against the university this morning.
This grievance is on behalf of members who are being required to work on campus (under threat of dismissal) despite being at risk of exposure to the virus. The grievance also reiterates GEO’s demands, as outlined in the January petition, for worker choice of modality, an exposure notification system, consistent checking of building access, frequent testing and more N95/KN95 masks.
Despite months of GEO pursuing actions through appropriate channels, the university refuses to take responsibility for the safety of its students and workers, leaving us with no choice but to file a grievance. In fact, instead of taking GEO’s demands seriously, the administration sent us a letter threatening to take disciplinary action against graduate workers who choose to work online.
The letter, from Robb Craddock, Senior Director of Labor and Employee Relations for UIUC, coincided with the cancellation of the Online Work Action—wherein TAs would take their classes online on February 2nd-4th—when the UIUC administration elected to move all in-person classes online due to the intense snowfall during those days. The administration’s willingness to accept a change in instructional modality to promote safety in the face of adverse weather conditions stands in stark contrast to their unwillingness to do so in order to mitigate the spread of COVID-19. Accommodations were apparently in order during an emergency which could affect administrators, but those same administrators have rejected proposals for the same accommodations for an issue that primarily affects students and graduate workers.
An example of UIUC’s irresponsible approach is the relaxation of testing requirements, despite the Omicron variant being highly contagious and more likely to evade vaccine protection. According to Hallie Workman, a teaching assistant in the Department of Communication, “I've been teaching in person throughout the whole pandemic. I felt safer teaching in August of 2020 than I do today. Now that the university isn't enforcing its testing and building access policy, I don't feel like I can keep my students safe in my classroom.”
The building access policy, whose enforcement was already lax in Fall 2021, has been relaxed even further. Hallie adds, “I've had students coming to class in person for weeks even though they've had their building access revoked. There's no enforcement. The administration told us that they were doing everything they could to keep us and our students safe, but that's no longer the case.”
In addition to filing a grievance, GEO is engaging in Impact Bargaining with the university today. Though the process has been ongoing for months and Craddock and company refuse to budge, GEO is optimistic that today’s session will lead to progress towards a safer campus.
Graduate workers put themselves at risk for contracting or spreading COVID-19 every time they appear for in-person work. This represents a clear threat to health and safety no less real than dangerous weather conditions. While the on-campus incidence rate has fallen from the peak of the Omicron surge, the UIUC administration’s current approach to the pandemic remains fundamentally reactive, and members of the university community cannot feel secure in the knowledge that they will be adequately protected as new variants inevitably emerge due to failures of national and international pandemic mitigation policies. As one of the country’s major public university systems, the University of Illinois has not only the responsibility to protect all members of its community—especially the most vulnerable—but also the opportunity to lead by example throughout future stages of this continuously evolving and still-very-present pandemic.
The Graduate Employees’ Organization, AFT/IFT Local 6300, AFL-CIO, at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, represents approximately 2,700 Teaching and Graduate Assistants on the UIUC Campus. In November 2009 and in February 2018, over 1,000 GEO members and allies participated in a strike to secure a fair contract and a more accessible UIUC campus. With an active presence in the community, the GEO continues to work for high-quality and accessible public education in Illinois.
For more information, please contact geo@uigeo.org. More information can also be found on GEO’s website at www.uiucgeo.org.
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