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The leadership and bargaining team of CUPE Local 3903, the union representing strikers at Toronto’s York University, have released a statement to their membership urging them to reject the university’s latest contract offer.
“Once the membership rejects not only this offer,” the letter says, “but also the offensive manner in which it is being forced on us, we will be in an exceptionally strong position to come to a speedy resolution of the strike.”
To keep tabs on our ongoing coverage of the York strike, check out our Labor category archives, or just bookmark our main page.
The Economist looks at the changing economics of going to college, and how the financial crisis is going to change them more.
Key passage: Private borrowing for college has increased sevenfold in the last decade, and is set to rise even more. But if “a student is going to borrow, it is generally better to go through the government.” As a spokesperson for The Institute for College Access and Success puts it, private loans “really are not a form of student aid … they’re an expensive form of credit.”
The Economist‘s conclusion? “By bailing out some of the private lenders, [Treasury Secretary] Paulson risks giving the seal of government approval to a sometimes dodgy business.”
Update: When a center-right magazine like The Economist sides with students over banks, they’re going to provoke some interesting responses. Here’s my favorite screech from the comments on that piece:
The reality is too many people go to college, it lasts too long (+4 years in the US, only 3 in the UK), too many students study nonsense, and college professors teach too much nonsense. Students spend their 4-5 years taking classes in wine-tasting and astrology to round out their majors in Marxism or Interpretive Dance Theory. […] We NEED student loans to dry up because we need our terrible education system to die and be replaced by something better.
As the strike at York University moves into its third month, the university has moved to force a vote on their latest offer, against the wishes of the union they have been negotiating with.
Under Ontario law, the university may call a vote on an offer on the table once during negotiations. The Ontario Labor Relations Board will now make arrangements for the vote, which is expected to take place in the next seven to ten days. It has been estimated that it will take 72 hours to reopen the university after any agreement is reached.
Each of the three striking units — Teaching Assistants, contract faculty, and Graduate Assistants — will vote separately on the plan, with a majority “yes” vote required to approve the contract for each unit.
York used the same tactic in a similar strike eight years ago. Then, contract faculty approved the offer but TAs rejected it, negotiating a separate settlement.
Update: Here are the university’s statement on its decision to force a vote, and the union’s response, taken from its strike blog.
Second Update: This post is just one in a growing series of studentactivism.net posts on the York University strike, but somehow it wound up with pride of place in Google. To keep tabs on our ongoing coverage of the strike, check out our Labor category archives or our main page.
Here’s the latest on the strike at Toronto’s York University, which has largely shuttered the campus since November 6:
The striking union rejected the university’s latest offer last night, and negotiations are set to resume today. Some university community members have called on the Ontario legislature to force the strikers back to work, but the legislature is currently in recess, and will be for another month.
And here are some local resources on the strike:
A student blog that describes itself as “a neutral atmosphere for discussions about the strike.”
The website and facebook group of a group calling for binding arbitration to resolve the dispute — a position the university endorses and the union opposes.
The official websites of York University and the striking union local, and the union’s strike blog.
To keep tabs on our ongoing coverage of the York strike, check out our Labor category archives, or just bookmark our main page.
For two months, a strike by Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 3903 has shut down Toronto’s York University.
The strike, by teaching assistants and other employees, has left the university’s 50,000 students unable to return to class, and some of them are beginning to take matters into their own hands:
- On Sunday, a group of several dozen students launched a sit-in outside the university president’s office, demanding that he hold a public forum to answer students’ questions about the strike. (The sit-in is a continuation of a four-day protest that was held before the Christmas break.)
- On Tuesday, the university’s student government presented administrators and union officials with a 4000-signature petition urging both sides to reach an agreement that addresses students’ needs.
- Today, the student government is holding a board meeting to discuss the creation of an emergency relief fund to provide financial assistance to students experiencing hardship as a result of the strike.
After weeks away from the table, university and union officials began negotiating over the weekend. Talks continue, but there has been no breakthrough so far.
January 11 Update: If you arrived at this post directly from a search, click through to (or bookmark) the blog’s main page to see all posts on this subject.
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