Stronger Together: Unions and Students Ally to Fight Higher Fees
Fall 2015
By Jennifer Berkshire, Union News editor
The message delivered to UMass Board of Trustees on September 16 couldn’t have been clear: fee increases are akin to “digging an ever-deeper well of student debt.” But the messengers weren’t just students. Instead, an alliance of students, faculty and staff, all working together to tell university administrators: “enough.”
Nationally, union members have higher wages and greater benefits (especially pensions and health care). Many non-tenure track faculty across the country, for example, do not have health care benefits and access to the employer’s pension plan, when they are not unionized.
A provost vetoes a faculty hiring decision. Faculty are notified via memo that a program will now be housed in their department. A meeting of the Faculty Senate is dominated by administrators.
