Though graduate students can join three different representative organizations, not all of them are created equal - at least in the eyes of Penn administrators.
And that has led to some tense relations in the world of graduate student politics.
Two student-government groups - the Graduate and Professional Student Assembly and the Graduate Student Associations Council - are both considered legitimate by administrators, while Graduate Employees Together - UPenn is not.
Group leaders say that the administration's discrimination between student-government groups and GET-UP, the would-be graduate-student union, has cooled relations between the two. Although they all say that they have students' interests at heart, the groups barely speak.
In spite of their differences, though, the groups are trying to give cooperation a chance. They are scheduled to sit down to talk within the next two weeks.
GAPSA and GSAC are sister organizations that advise the administration on issues that concern graduate students, like interdisciplinary research and financing student activities.
GET-UP, on the other hand, is a group affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers union and wants to achieve collective bargaining rights in order to improve conditions for graduate students.
The National Labor Relations Board has ruled, however, that graduate-student workers do not have the right to organize.
"Historically, there hasn't been a lot of coordination between us," GET-UP spokesman and Communication graduate student Bill Herman said.
The student-government groups have not been quick to support GET-UP, either.
When GET-UP tried to achieve union status in 2003, GSAC issued a statement declaring its neutrality, declaring it was better for students on all sides "to have their voices heard."
Shortly after, GAPSA agreed with GSAC's stand.
"GAPSA works with the administration, while GET-UP tends to work against it," GAPSA chairman Lee Shaker said.
The administration has its own way of dealing with GET-UP - by refusing to speak with its members at all.
"I meet regularly with GAPSA and GSAC," President Amy Gutmann said. "GET-UP does not represent our graduate students."
According to Gutmann, representatives from the student-government groups are "the right people to bring up" issues.
If GET-UP wants to interact with administrators, she said, it will have to go through the other bodies.
But GET-UP leaders say this is unfair, especially because they say Gutmann promised to meet with them upon entrance into office.
"Amy Gutmann promised to meet with us, but now she only answers us by e-mail and refuses to see us," GET-UP chairwoman and Comparative Literature graduate student Julie Kruiden said.
But the one group which cannot get access to top administrators has a plan: Get a conversation going with those other groups.
Kruiden said she realizes that approaching GAPSA and GSAC may be the only way to push her group's agenda. Both she and Herman agree that though the organizations differ in their missions, starting talks between the groups may not be a bad idea.
"There's clearly some overlap between us, so there's no reason why we can't begin talking with the other groups," Herman said.
"I'm curious to find out what their current agenda is," Shaker said. "I'm looking forward to finding out their goals. If we feel we can help them out, we will."
