Indiana University Grad Workers Join Statewide Coalition With Other Universities
BLOOMINGTON, Ind.—On Friday, April 19, the Indiana Graduate Workers Coalition (IGWC) ended a three-day strike, which brought hundreds of graduate workers, faculty, staff, undergraduate students, and local community and union supporters to the picket lines at Indiana University.
The three-day strike follows a historic vote of no confidence on Tuesday, April 16, when Bloomington faculty voted by overwhelming margins that they had no confidence in IU President Pamela Whitten (93%), Provost Rahul Shrivastav (91%), and Vice-Provost Carrie Docherty (75%). Prior to the faculty’s vote, the IGWC, 12 graduate student associations, and the Graduate and Professional Student Government all passed votes of no confidence in President Whitten. On Tuesday evening, the IU Board of Trustees ignored the votes and reaffirmed its commitment to Whitten and her administration.
The IGWC will devote its resources and experience to building a coalition of graduate workers at universities throughout Indiana to organize to demand union recognition and a living wage. Graduate workers at Purdue make a base stipend of about $20,000 on 10-month contracts in West Lafayette, where the annual cost of living is $40,000. Graduate workers at IU Indianapolis have no campus-wide base stipend and continue to pay the student fees that the IGWC pressured IU Bloomington to eliminate following our Spring 2022 strike.
“Due to the less-than-living wage, graduate workers at Purdue skip medications, utilities services, sometimes eat spoiled food to make ends meet,” Andy Lee, a graduate worker in the Department of Biological Sciences and organizer with Graduate Rights and Our Wellbeing (GROW) at Purdue, said. “This is unacceptable. We believe the university should be a place that supports everyone- including international students, first generation graduate students, graduate students with families, and other groups of traditionally marginalized communities within higher education. A work environment that only allows some of us to succeed is a failure.”
At IU Indianapolis, graduate workers suffer from a lack of uniform protections or assurances. The IUPUI split has been used to justify worsened conditions and uncertainty: Stipends often vary from department to department; Graduate workers routinely have their funding discontinued, international workers lack adequate and certain sources of income; Graduate workers have gone into medical debt due to inadequate coverage. With the rising cost of living in Indianapolis and stipends that don’t keep track, graduate workers at IU Indianapolis are struggling to support themselves in their programs. IUI’s vision is a campus that promotes “cutting-edge research, community support, [and] a better future.” However, IU Indy has left its graduate workers behind in the process.
“Our membership is working to build coalition with graduate worker leaders at these institutions and eager to expand our future efforts to coordinate with campuses across the state,” IGWC Organizing Coordinator Zara Anwarzai said. “We all are facing a shared struggle, against universities which are looking less and less like educational institutions and more like corporations. Graduate researchers and instructors produce world-class research and do a significant portion of the teaching labor at these schools. All the while, graduate workers are going into debt and selling their blood to make ends meet. Graduate workers across the state deserve their fair share and are preparing to fight for it alongside us.”
The IGWC is calling on graduate workers at universities across Indiana to start organizing and join our growing coalition by contacting us at indianagradworkers@gmail.com.