University of California Academic Workers Ratify Contract, Ending Strike

Union academic workers and supporters march and picket at the UCLA campus amid a statewide strike by nearly 48,000 University of California unionized workers in Los Angeles on Nov. 15, 2022. (Mario Tama/Getty Images)

Academic workers ratified their contract with the University of California (UC) just before the holidays, ending a six-week-long strike.

United Auto Workers—the union representing UC academic workers—announced Dec. 23 its members voted to ratify UC’s contract for academic student employees and graduate student researchers.

On Nov. 14, 48,000 researchers and student employees across all 10 UC campuses launched a strike, demanding pay raises due to cost-of-living increases.

About a quarter of strikers from two bargaining units—postdoctoral scholars and academic researchers—reached an agreement with the UC Nov. 29 and returned to work earlier this month.

The remaining 36,000 strikers in the other two bargaining units—academic workers and graduate student researchers—reached a tentative agreement with the UC Dec. 16 and voted to ratify the contracts a week later.

Letitia Stilas, the UC’s labor relations director, credited the use of a third-party mediator in helping reach a deal.

“The University of California welcomes the ratification of these agreements with our valued graduate student employees,” Silas said in a Dec. 23 statement. “The university believed that the assistance of a third-party mediator would help the parties reach an agreement, which is why we are so grateful that the union accepted our invitation to mediation and partnered with us in selecting Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg to serve as the mediator. As a result of this collaboration, the parties were ultimately able to reach tentative agreements on the contracts as a whole in just a few days following months of negotiations.”

Fall Grades

Because academic employees such as teaching assistants are often responsible for grading assignments, the strike left some professors without teaching assistants to grade assignments and end-of-semester exams.

It’s not yet clear when strikers will return to work or how UC will navigate unsubmitted final grades, and a spokesperson for the UC President’s Office was not immediately available for comment.

However, some campuses extended the deadlines for instructors to submit final grades—with UC Davis extending its deadline from Dec. 14 to Dec. 27, and UC Berkeley extending it from Dec. 21 to Dec. 31.

Earlier this month, a UC faculty association estimated its faculty members will withhold more than 37,000 student grades for the fall semester in solidarity with strikers.

With the strike over, it is unclear whether teaching assistants will make final grade deadlines.

UC Davis Provost Mary Croughan said in a statement earlier this month that not receiving a grade on final exams will not influence UC Davis students’ grade point average, financial aid, or eligibility for veteran benefits or visa status.

Contract Details

The ratified contract will raise the minimum pay for both academic student employees and graduate student workers from about $24,000 to $34,000, according to UC officials.

The union’s initial offer demanded that the UC more than double the base pay, but union leaders let their members vote on lowering the offer.

Other notable benefits include providing up to $2,025 in childcare reimbursements per semester and waiving supplemental tuition for nonresidents for up to three years for those who have advanced to candidacy in their graduate degree programs.

Meanwhile, the contract ratified last month for postdoctoral scholars includes up to a 23 percent salary increase by October 2023, up to $2,500 annual childcare reimbursement with annual $100 childcare increases over the next three years, two-year initial appointments, and a new paid leave program with 100 percent pay for up to eight weeks, according to union officials.

The contract for academic researchers includes a pay raise of 4.5 percent for the first year, 3.5 percent for the second, third, and fourth years, and 4 percent in the fifth year; eight weeks of 100 percent paid family leave; increased bereavement leave; and a new system to address workplace conduct and conflict resolution.