On Wednesday, the three-year collective bargaining agreement between Brown and the Graduate Labor Organization expired. But according to University officials and GLO, there is no end in sight for a new contract.
“While all parties have worked in good faith since February to bargain toward a new contract, including a final session yesterday before the contract expiration, we remain far apart on important issues,” Provost Francis Doyle and Executive Vice President for Finance and Administration Sarah Latham wrote in a Wednesday Today@Brown message.
When negotiations began in February, GLO proposed a 12% base stipend increase for fiscal year 2027, resulting in a stipend of $58,462. The union also proposed another 11% stipend increase in FY28 and a 10% increase in FY29. Other proposals included significantly expanded childcare subsidies and the ability to participate in the University’s 403(b) retirement program.
In the message, Doyle and Latham wrote that these financial proposals would exceed the salary increases of all other employee groups on campus and noted that the current base doctoral stipend is higher than all Ivy-plus schools, aside from Stanford University, due to the high cost of living in Palo Alto, California.
The University countered GLO’s proposal by offering a 6.7% stipend increase over five years, as well as a $20,000 increase in an assistance fund to support international graduate workers.
“While it remains on the table, we have made little progress on economic terms in recent bargaining sessions,” Doyle and Latham wrote.
“Our philosophy about crafting our wage proposals is about what it costs to live in this area,” said Michael Ziegler GS, the president of GLO’s parent group, RIFT-AFT Local 6516. He noted that progress in graduate contract negotiations at peer schools may make Brown’s stipend less competitive within the next five years.
In response to the union’s economic proposals, “Brown’s bargaining team consulted with colleagues in multiple offices, projected the impacts on finances, considered the proposal in the context of the vast expansions in support for graduate students in recent years (and) assessed the economic terms against those of peer institutions,” according to University spokesperson Brian Clark.
In the message, the University also reiterated its position of not recognizing graduate fellows as members of the bargaining unit.
In March, graduate fellows sought union recognition from the University on the basis of a newly passed Rhode Island law that explicitly codifies the right of all graduate students, including fellows, to unionize. About two weeks later, the University declined to voluntarily recognize graduate fellows.
Most fellows “receive Brown funding exclusively in support of their academic work, with no exchange of services performed for the University, and they therefore do not meet the common law definition of employees,” Doyle and Latham wrote in the Wednesday message. “For these reasons, the University declined to grant voluntary recognition to students on fellowship when GLO requested this.”
According to Michael Ziegler, the union has sent Doyle and President Christina Paxson P’19 P’MD’20 “over 100 emails” containing testimonials from graduate fellows about the services they believe they provide for the University.
Latham and Doyle also noted that fellows are already guaranteed the same stipend as graduate workers in the bargaining unit.
According to the Today@Brown message, GLO declined to begin negotiations with the University last summer. Ziegler said that the union declined because they needed to survey members on what they wanted from negotiations, noting that negotiations for the previous contract began in February rather than the summer.
Clark said that the University attempted to begin negotiations with GLO earlier than the previous contract because of the lengthy negotiations.
“The fact that bargaining took 10 months in the case of the 2023 agreement was precisely why the University reached out to the union with the hope of an early start to the current negotiations,” he wrote in an email to The Herald.
According to Ziegler, the University has played a part in negotiation delays. He noted that Brown didn’t respond to several proposals submitted in early April until mid to late June.
Ziegler said the union is planning to invite Doyle and Latham to its next bargaining session on July 13 in response to the Today@Brown message.
“Given the fact that they have made these statements about the equity of their proposal to the University community, the least they can do is come and allow us to have that discussion with them,” Ziegler said.
Emily Feil is a university news and metro editor covering staff & student labor and RISD. She is from Long Beach, NY and plans to concentrate in English and international & public affairs. In her free time, she can be found watching bad TV and reading good books.
