RATIFICATION VOTE RESULTS:

By a margin of 62% to 38% (1476-918), members have voted to ratify the contract. A significant percentage of members voted to reject this deal, and it’s clear that there are areas in the contract that do not meet the needs of all ASEs and therefore demand further action. You can find the full text of the final ratified proposals here.

We also want to be very clear that the fight is NOT over on fees. While we have secured coverage for the IMA Bond Fee as well as a process for bargaining in coalition with other unions over the cost of the U-PASS later in the summer, there is still much we can do to fight for improvements on all remaining fees. Moving forward, it’s critical that we continue building on the departmental organizing, to sustain contact with members and plan for continued actions.

NEXT STEPS:

Debrief Meeting: Tuesday (6/5) at 5:30 (location TBD), we will be holding a member meeting to debrief the contract campaign, discuss what we’ve learned, and how we can improve moving forward.

U-Pass: This summer there will be coalition bargaining with 3 other unions on campus to negotiate the price of the U-Pass fee. Our goal is to reduce this fee to $0.

Paid family leave: The state legislature this summer is working out the rules for the new statewide paid family leave policy. Our new contract includes a memorandum to reopen Article 16 of our contract this Fall, in order to negotiate incorporating the new benefits for ASEs.

Postdoc campaign: The UW Postdocs voted 90% to join our union as a separate unit. So far, UW has not responded to either of the Postdocs’ two demands to bargain. It is crucial for the strength of our union to help these newest members in their fight to begin bargaining and secure a fair contract.

Standing strike committee: We encourage those members who are interested to join a standing strike committee to discuss organizing, legal issues, funding, logistics, and other important pieces so that we are ready for future actions. We’ll talk about this in further detail at the debrief meeting Tuesday, and in the meantime interested members can email uaw4121@uaw4121.org.

Solidarity with other campus unions: We can and should leverage our own power and our solidarity with other unions to enable them to win the best contracts they can, including by showing up for their upcoming contract campaigns as they did for ours. We’ll regularly send out opportunities for joining other campus unions in action and demonstrating solidarity as they arise.

On May 15th, over 2,000 ASEs joined the picket line for a one-day strike. As far as we are aware, this was the largest strike at UW ever by any group of workers. This new contract, compared to the UW admin’s final offer on 4/30, includes $1,800,000 more in funding for healthcare, childcare, and fee relief, as well as new protections against future fee increases and additional rights. While membership has ultimately voted not to go on strike tomorrow, the power of a strike has become real again.

We are no longer planning a strike for this quarter, but there are many ways we can work together and continue to take action.

As always, please contact us with any questions or feedback at uaw4121@uaw4121.org.

In Solidarity,

UAW 4121 Bargaining Committee