United Auto Workers

It is crucial to remember that seeking more benefits and support is not just for UC Berkeley’s sake — it’s for all the UC campuses.

After six weeks of striking, academic employees represented by United Auto Workers, or UAW, 2865 and SRU-UAW voted to ratify the tentative agreements with the University of California on Friday — bringing an end to the largest academic workers strike in U.S. history. 

This policy has been in place since 2010. It’s the end of 2022, and tens of thousands of academic workers represented by UAW local unions are on strike because the UC system isn’t negotiating fairly at the bargaining table to make progress on urgent issues of equity. It’s time for the UC system to show it values its workers from all backgrounds.

UC Berkeley faculty stood on the steps of Sproul Plaza, donned in faculty robes and carrying United Auto Workers, or UAW, union signs, looking out on a sea of striking academic workers. 

48,000 academic workers in the United Auto Workers union – which includes postdoctoral scholars, academic researchers, academic student employees and graduate student researchers – across the university went on strike on Monday.

After months of bargaining, the United Auto Workers, or UAW, union that represents postdoctoral scholars, academic researchers, academic student employees and graduate student researchers has had enough. At 8 a.m. this morning, 48,000 academic workers across the UC system have gone on strike. As of press time, there is no end in sight.

Undergraduates can participate in a number of ways to use their powerful bargaining positions to help. 

United Auto Workers voted to authorize a strike consisting of postdoctoral scholars, academic researchers, academic student employees and graduate student researchers Wednesday.

Hundreds of graduate student workers, represented by the union United Auto Workers, or UAW, protested UC employment policies on the UC Berkeley campus Tuesday. 

The university agreed Wednesday to recognize Student Researchers United, or SRU, a union representing 17,000 student researchers employed by the UC system.