Posts tagged University of Illinois
University of Illinois nurses authorize strike at UI Health on Chicago’s Near West Side
August 8, 2024 // More than 1,300 University of Illinois nurses cast ballots last week, with nearly 98% voting to authorize a strike, amid a stalemate with management at the bargaining table. The nurses' union, the Illinois Nurses Association, said they've seen a large rise in assaults on staff in the last four years. They are demanding safer working conditions, increased staffing, and higher pay. The union said they have offered a number of proposals in an effort to reach an agreement on a new contract, but management has responded to only a handful, and most of them have been rejected.
‘Many of us are struggling’: why US universities are facing a wave of strikes
April 24, 2023 // Thousands of workers at universities have gone on strike in 2023 amid new union contract negotiations in demand of pay increases that align with the effect high inflation rates have had on the cost of living. The strikes are a continuation of wave of industrial action in higher education in the US last year. In late 2022, 48,000 graduate workers and post-doctoral researchers went on strike throughout the University of California system, the largest strike in US higher education history. There were 15 academic strikes in the US in 2022, the highest number of strikes in academia in at least 20 years.
Opinion: Corruption thrives in a one-party state
February 16, 2023 // The 2021 annual report of the California Partners Project describes the organization as “partnered with” The Representation Project. The report notes that “partner is a power position” and vows “even closer collaboration with the Office of the First Partner” to “leverage all the resources we can muster….” There was a lot of harnessing and leveraging of the governor’s power to raise money through “behested payments,” a uniquely California form of legalized extortion. Elected officials are allowed to ask individuals, companies, unions or other entities to make a donation for a particular “charitable” or “governmental” purpose. “Behested payments” that total more than $5,000 in a year must be reported, but there is no ceiling on how much an official may request. Reports show that in 2021 and 2022, Gov. Newsom “behested” $1,671,680 for his wife’s California Partners Project.
UIC students confront a third day of canceled classes as faculty strike continues
January 20, 2023 // UIC’s 900-member faculty union is pushing for higher minimum salaries and more investment in student mental health services. Administrators have said they are limited by tuition revenue and state funding.
New unions struggling with contracts
June 3, 2022 //
IU faculty votes to support grad students unionizing
June 2, 2022 // Grad students are seeking fee changes, improved stipends and union recognition.
U of I service employees set to vote on strike authorization
May 3, 2022 // It would be the first strike by university service employees since 2013, and that strike prompted the university to declare its first-ever civil service emergency. If a strike were to occur, campus trash cans would not be emptied, bathrooms in university buildings would not be cleaned and food in dining halls would not be made.