Fall may be a time for new beginnings, but this one has featured a series of false starts and disappointments for three organizing efforts in higher education.

First, the National Labor Relations Board ruled against Penn graduate employees’ right to unionize. The decision, announced Aug. 25, echoed a similar one at Brown University and bodes ill for future efforts at other private institutions. "Bound by the Board’s decision in Brown," says NLRB regional director Dorothy Moore-Duncan, the setback is based on that July ruling, which declared graduate student assistants students "first and foremost," not workers. That determination, which overturned a 2000 NLRB ruling at New York University granting graduate assistants the right to unionize, was made by a Republican-controlled Board in a party-line vote of 3-2.

The union, Graduate Employees Together-University of Pennsylvania/AFT (GET-UP) vows to continue its fight.

Even for those already organized, the struggle continues. At the University of Florida, the newly recertified Graduate Assistants United/AFT had to fight for the first paychecks of fall. Blamed on an unfamiliar computer system and tardy payroll submissions from departments, the glitch nevertheless left graduate assistants with no pay just hours before Hurricane Frances hit on Sept. 3. Thanks to the union, some graduate assistants lined up at the payroll office and were able to extract their money, but others had to go without, and at least 125 were still waiting for pay as they dug out from flooding and wind damage the following week.

In a third blow for higher ed unions, the Graduate Employees Organization/AFT at the University of Illinois fought similar paycheck issues and filed an unfair labor practice complaint for violations regarding tuition waivers, union dues, and notification of employees about the union. Like Florida, Illinois has claimed computer confusion – tuition waivers did not go through, and no system is in place to deduct union dues from paychecks. Although two e-mail messages were sent as union notification, individuals were refused a platform at a teacher assistant orientation. All this just two weeks into a newly ratified contract.

In such a climate, where organizing is restricted and, even when it is achieved, new chapters must fight for basic pay and benefits, organizers may want to sharpen their pencils to keep up with early threats to a fair and peaceful beginning to the academic year. “It’s incumbent upon unions that are older --  not only graduate unions, but faculty and teacher unions -- to make sure these newly formed unions and campaigns are able to thrive and gain a foothold,” says Chris Goff, a member of the 27-year-old Graduate Teaching Fellows/AFT at the University of Oregon and liaison to the Higher Education Program and Policy Council. “If people on the ground are committed to this, I think a grassroots effort can get these places up and running, despite all these setbacks.”

[Virginia Myers Kelly]