Strike unlikely to bring officials, GET-UP to bargaining table

Though the Graduate Employees Together-University of Pennsylvania two-day strike that begins today will increase the group's visibility nationally and on campus, University officials are unlikely to capitulate to the group's demands and drop the appeal to the National Labor Relations Board.

Still, the purpose of the strike which is being held on the one-year anniversary of the graduate students' vote on unionization is to commemorate that event. It will likely succeed in its intentions to protest what GET-UP spokesman Dillon Brown called "the silencing of our voices" and to indicate "our resolve in not allowing the University to continue to impede the Democratic process."

Penn is unlikely to see much of a disturbance in terms of academics, but the effort could also set the stage for more disruptive efforts much like those that graduate students at other universities have attempted.

However, though both Yale and New York University graduate students have tried to implement strikes to achieve unionization, their results have been mixed.

Yale's Graduate Employees and Students Organization struck three times before achieving what GESO Chairwoman Mary Reynolds called a satisfactory agreement with the university, though they have not won the right to unionize.

In 1995, Yale graduate students staged a "grade strike" withholding end-of-term marks from undergraduates. That strike failed to win the organization recognition from the university, but it set the stage for further strikes at Yale, as well as a movement to strike at NYU.

However, just the threat of a strike at NYU proved successful for the school's graduate students. After holding a strike authorization vote, which demonstrated overwhelming graduate and undergraduate support, the administration agreed to meet the group at the bargaining table in 2001, according to Michael Palmer, a member of theNYUGraduate Student Organizing Committee.

Soon after, graduate students at NYU were the first at a private university to achieve the right to unionize.

Despite subsequent strikes by Yale's graduate students, they still have not won the right to unionize and have given up any intention to vote. "The Yale administration has said that it would never recognize the results of the [National Labor Relations Board] decision," Reynolds said.

While GET-UP's efforts have made the organization's concerns a prominent subject of discourse again after a lull following the graduate student vote, it is doubtful that the strike will have any lasting effect on Penn's administration.

Brown said that no larger-scale strikes are planned at this time. "But surely if our concerns continue to remain unaddressed, we would consider that possibility."

Indeed, GET-UP will need to make a drastic move along the lines of Yale's grade strike in order to have a greater impact on the community before the NLRB ruling on Penn's appeal.

Otherwise, the buzz surrounding GET-UP's efforts is likely to subside while normal activities proceed on campus before, during and after the strike.

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