Resident assistants at University of Massachusetts at Amherst, dissatisfied with their low wages, will have the opportunity to join a union for bargaining purposes, the Massachusetts Labor Relations Commission ruled last week.
The school’s resident assistants will have a chance to vote on joining the United Auto Workers local 2322, which local union President James Shaw said could be used as a “bargaining unit” to help RAs get a contract.
“We’re really excited,” Shaw said. “This is a new vanguard for the employees. RAs begged for changes, and the bosses refused. Now management will be forced to make changes.”
The topic was broached last spring when UMass-Amherst RAs floated petitions around campus.
If the RAs do vote to join the union, the UAW would help the RAs get a contract and then vote on accepting the terms of the contract, Shaw said. The RAs would then have to pay union dues once the contract was put into place.
Some RAs at the school have disputed the need for unionization. In an editorial column printed in The Massachusetts Daily Collegian last April, UMass-Amherst RA Rob Schulze said greed is the driving factor behind the push for joining the UAW. According to Schulze, UMass-Amherst RAs receive a double occupancy room to themselves, plus a payment of $50 per week.
The UMass-Amherst administration shares Schulze’s views on the UAW proposal.
“Most administrations across the country would be opposed to undergraduates joining a union,” said UMass-Amherst spokeswoman Kay Scanlan. “They are students first and foremost. Obviously they work here, but we always consider them students first.
“Most RAs work one semester or one year, then they’re gone,” she said. “They are not a stable class of employees.”
While Shaw acknowledged 50 percent of the RAs at UMass-Amherst are new every year, he said the UAW “represents a lot of low-income workers” who are in fields with high turnover rates, including graduate students, day care employees and maintenance workers.
Scanlan says that the UMass-Amherst administration will “abide by the decision” but warns court proceedings may be needed in the future.
“It’s not at all clear what to do right now,” she said. “It will be a long, laborious procedure that will take several years.”
According to the Associated Press, RAs at UMass-Amherst make $140 per week. About $90 is automatically deducted for housing costs, leaving the RAs with a $50 paycheck.
Shaw argued this is unfair because RAs conduct business in their rooms.
“RAs are forced to pay rent on their office space,” he said.
Boston University RAs generally receive room and board as remuneration. Myles Standish Annex RA Jessica Egerton, a College of Arts and Sciences and College of Communication junior, said the UMass-Amherst RAs have a legitimate complaint.
“If I had free room and board and $50 a week, I wouldn’t have to have a second job,” Egerton said. “I wouldn’t complain. I’d be happy for it.”
However, College of Engineering junior Michael McCullough, an RA on Bay State Road, agreed with Schulze.
“Unions were created to prevent employees from being taken advantage of,” he said. “Is that really necessary in a university setting?”
This is an account occasionally used by the Daily Free Press editors to post archived posts from previous iterations of the site or otherwise for special circumstance publications. See authorship info on the byline at the top of the page.
