Planning and Communications Big Event Planning – Notes by Joseph Dang, UChicago Kevin Tian - Pres of Harvard Grad Council German, Chemical Engineering MIT, Orientation Cassandra, Cornell GPSA, Ph.D animal science, part of appropriations committee JD, 2nd year MBA at UChicago, GC Co-pres Miles, pres, dual deg, Penn Hendi, chair of health and life, Princeton, Zack, ops research, Princeton, Treasurer Savannah, Pres, Yale Ebony, pathobiology medicine, public affairs, Treasurer, Brown Rachel Brogue, 2nd year immunology, Housing/activities coordinator - helping international students Molly, MIT, biological engineering, Co-chair for Grad Women Dana, Harvard Advocacy Chair Andrew, VP Columbia, Chemistry Paul, Penn, Treasurer Wendy, Chair of Grad Assembly, Yale Biggest Challenge Harvard - rebuilding the whole network of communication - finding effective ways to reach out to the different communities. General communication. Physical proximity to schools. Colleges are self-identified and big on their own events - collaboration between is difficult Yale - communication is an issue (people not reading emails) - oversubscribe, no-shows Penn - alcohol is a problem - university policies that treat graduates as if they are undergrads. Sell-out events but not diversified attendance. Undergrad fraternity parties that got bad - UGs in the hospital. How administration interprets liquor laws Columbia - support form administrators and staff -roadblocks - have to plan in advance, signoffs, facilities requirements MIT -getting the word out, recognition, attendance is poor, general engagement of students. How to coordinate schedules between different schools, how to do money (external account or accounts at school-level) Dartmouth - attendance diversity Brown - two listservs - all grads (sell bikes, can opt out), Morning Mail for each group. Space is controlled by grad students Yale - external bank account with Wells Fargo, subsidized bar. Biggest issue is getting people from different schools to interact. Find ways to get people to interact and mix more without it seeming forced. Architecture and drama have intense schedules and don't get students to come from each school. Push for non-alcohol events -can't get people to go (trivia night, competition between schools) Princeton - too much communication, each student group can send once a quarter. Big events are well attended. Robust discretionary fund - can move money around Cornell - communication with professional schools (field reps don't have listserv for their schools) Chicago - engaging ALL students (some don't want to go to mainstream events) MIT -gauging attendance for new events - get more food than needed. AV is really expensive (got their own speaker system) - stored in office. Only one professional school - completely separate. Not enough people doing things

Discussion Action items

Communication o Penn: Listserv - university, different registrars (Cornell), opt-in newsletter, autorefers - if

you sign up for one, do you want to sign up for all. Registrars that only cover some schools

o Yale: grad and professional listserv - admin in senate has access, no restrictions. Automatic weekly announcements -70% open rate. Trying to use facebook more consistently Grads can submit own events

o Mailchimp, Outlook sometimes count open rates o Feedback loops o Buy it early - cheaper price o Emails to grad residences, to admins

Long term initiatives – Notes by Tobias Egle, Harvard

Kick-off bullet points: Mental Health, D&I, Parental Support, G1 welcome events, Housing, Graduate

Student Involvement

External Affairs Boards @MIT

- Policy platform with by-laws makes long-term initiatives effective, NAGPS (grad student group

dealing with advocacy) legislative action days for advocacy work

- Form external affairs board for effective advocacy for grad student affairs (housing issues,

immigration, infrastructure, voter registration (turbo vote), etc.) at local and national level

- Very easy to contact local government staff, people are open to help and facilitate according to

their experience.

- MIT advocated for: Grad student finances, Immigration, Gender equality, Science funding,

infrastructure development

Increase attendance at Grad Student Council

- @Columbia: Communications chair contacts departmental admins for them to make their

students aware of that this is THE grad student body, what things they do, if people don’t come

their students can’t get funds/ grants

- @UChicago: increase responsiveness and participation by making emails come from the Dean

Access to e-mail addresses for better outreach@Yale

- They can pull e-mail addresses separated by department from the GSAS directory

5-year strategic plan @Cornell

- Plan to create working groups in a plan that is signed by both student leaders and admins

- Institutionalize initiatives if you want them to be successful!

- Holding people accountable with a strategic plan

- Creates institutional knowledge, not reinvent the wheel every 10 years

Exec board retreat@Harvard

- Good documentation as well as in-and-out going executive board retreat for members of the

council are very helpful for a smooth transition.

Outreach&Awareness@UChicago

- Website

- Speech at Orientation making GSC and their ideas known was helpful

Debrief Emails to Dept. Reps to make sure they communicate decisions within their

department@Columbia

Recruit Board early! @Cornell

Communication and organization tools- Notes by Frank Cusimano, Columbia 1. Introductions 2. Communication

a. Within your executive group i. Slack

1. Paid vs Non-paid 2. True functionality and possibilities 3. Using Bots in slack to set reminders, voting, etc.

ii. GroupMe b. At large with the rest of the school

i. How to communicate ii. Going through department reps (DRs)

1. Facilitate survey’s through the DRs instead of at large iii. Communicate with students directly

3. Archiving & Organization a. Archiving each year

i. OrgSync 1. Takes the place of university event planners 2. Student Data 3. Weekly newsletters 4. EventBrite

b. Transitioning c. Timeline (replacing Blackboard)

i. Program to link with calendar ii. Includes announcements

iii. Events 4. Newsletter

a. Opt-In b. Student Groups can submit events

5. How do we assign communicating on all of the various platforms? a. Chair of Communications

i. Responsible for delegating or communicating ii. Responsible for all platforms

b. Through Chair and through DRs c. Communications Committee

i. Easy way to facilitate 6. School Specific Apps

a. Useful but takes buy-in

Advocacy and Inclusion Family support – Notes by Aislinn Rowan, Brown

Yale new family support policy to equalize benefit to more people o Compiled peer institution research, made formal report to administration, worked with

them to develop new program o Found that previously there was a hidden benefit for students with families who had to

insure spouses on Yale health Old system

Yale generally covers half of the cost of a student’s spouse’s health insurance through Yale

Yale was also providing full health insurance for spouses of grad students with children for the first year after birth

This benefit was only going to those students with children who had spouses enrolled in Yale health insurance

o Not those who had healthcare elsewhere o Not single parents

Invested $400,000 to improve it

Now you just get $4500 when you have a kid, which could cover spousal healthcare, or childcare expenses, etc., so you get the benefit without needing to enroll spouse

o $4500 is the difference between the half-coverage of a spouse and the full-coverage of a spouse

Still pays half of spousal insurance regardless

Single parents get child care support PLUS this benefit now, so it isn’t just benefiting married couples with children

Prorated based on when child is born Also $1000 bonus per additional child All children are covered by Yale’s insurance anyway Advice: do peer institution research and show them how badly they’re doing in

comparison

Harvard has about 6% student parents o Reported at registration

Many of the children were over age five (~1/3) Many of these were master’s programs

o Care.com platform for finding caregivers and access to backup care MIT has free membership in this Allows you to post for nannies and caregivers Provides access to subsidized backup care

Prescreened/background checked person can come in for $5/hour or go to a center for $10/day if there is an open spot (any center in country that works with care.com, good for conferences)

Also for adult care, which didn’t require a huge admin shift because it isn’t a big driving need (just rolled out in Oct so will need to assess later)

o 12 weeks of parental leave Can split the leave across the year, especially good for non-birthing parents

Also has relief of duties of teaching or classes, which is separate from actual “leave”

Adjust deadlines for progression based on children o 6 childcare centers but it takes a year or so to get through the waitlist

Only one isn’t actually the full cost of your stipend per month, so, not exactly affordable

o You need to be able to know about the special funds (i.e.- for single parents), and go seek them out on your own

Princeton o NJ won’t let you keep a child over age 2 in a 1-bedroom o Many don’t report having children because they would have to move and pay more for

rent o If you are past 5 years and are in “degree completion enrollment”, you can’t push

deadlines back for family support Despite being more likely to have kids at this time of life

o Just built a new center More expensive than other options but available to grad students

Columbia o $2000/AY but actual cost is more like $30,000 o 12 weeks leave but 14 week semester

Makes scheduling leave very awkward in some scenarios (i.e.- teaching responsibilities)

o Don’t have a daycare center but it should be their responsibility

This is a general problem with American and the fact that most of this is not institutionalized has anyone thought about thinking about it from a community/society standpoint

o Germany up to a year at full salary, or ¾ for 18 months & allow for part-time jobs when transitioning back

o Make push for maternity/paternity leave at same time to help not make it a women’s issue

But can be hard to separate when men use this time to work on their career from home

Or for example getting an extra year for tenure even though you didn’t actually take leave

Part of the gender pay gap So much of it is just social change where the woman is not by default the

primary caregiver o But also, there is only so much we can do as graduate students and we need to

remember that different things work for different families

Diversity and inclusion – Notes by Zach Hervieux-Moore, Princeton Kevin Tian - moderator Brown - Ebony (treasurer and president black grad) & D'Ondre - Brown celebrating over diversity. Most diverse class this upcoming year. No small part in due to DIAP (diversity and inclusion action plan). - Initiatives: Open house - prospective students from under represented groups can come and visit the school. Administration thinking about how to support students of color. - Deficiencies: None to report, just inacting the action plan and so have to wait sometime to see the effects/deficiencies. Moving away from the Federal definition of historically under represented groups. Columbia - Milica - To best of knowledge, no broad plan for diversity and inclusion plans. 53% international student body. - Initiatives: Outreach strategies to allow voices to be heard. Trying to develop resources for students with disabililities. - Deficiencies: International students not knowledgeable of the resources available. Very limited data on people with disabilities. Concerns about letting their departments know about their disabilities, although, the office for disabilities is welcoming. Cornell - - Very serious hate crimes on campus recently. Has started a movement on campus of students that are voicing their concerns and their requests (more funding, etc.) - Initiatives: Diversity programming weekend, the life sciences bring prospective students to campus and show the resources available to them on campus. - Deficiencies: TA's don't have mandatory training. Dartmouth - Sally - Don't historically have much diversity. Engineering school much more diverse (international) than other schools. - Initiatives: Increase in summer programs to entice under represented undergrads to apply for graduate school. Trying to recruit and build the diversity programs. Harvard - - Each college has their own diversity representative. - Initiatives: Humans of GSAS - weekly photoblog depicting the various backgrounds and achievements of the graduate student body. The Whips (spelling?) - TED talk type setting where students can share their work, advocacy, and their ideas. President reached out to each college representative to collect all the issues. Administration actively looking for input from students on appointment of faculty appointments. Make a unifying plan for the whole university to make the mechanism of diversity feedback more clear. Administration started diversity & inclusion task force to collect information across the colleges and evaluate whether or not they are succeeding. - Deficiences: Each college has their own control. Something that we need to work more on and is a core issue. MIT - Ty - Initiatives: Establish representation. Focusing on checks and balances. One World, One MIT - Increasing women hires and under represented minorities. Increasing post-doc exposure for these

groups. Have MLK scholars that talk about their experiences. Classroom Inclusion program. Establish university best practices to be more inclusive in labs, studios, how advisors can be mentors. Action retention plan, if we do a good job at keeping people of color, they will bring in other people of color. Department of Architecture - making sure students stay at the table during hiring decisions. Diversity and inclusion training. Have to do a better job at getting rid of pre-meditative bias. Make diversity and inclusion part of faculty review UPenn - Buyan - Part of TA training is a full day on diversity and inclusion. - Initiatives: IDEAL - New official body for affinity groups to be represented on council, before it was just a committee. Difference is now they have members on Assembly. Also, better exposure to administration and they have to recognize IDEAL. - Deficiencies: Very decentralized, working on a central diversity office and getting a diversity officer which would outline hiring practices and training procedures. Princeton - Bernat - Initiatives: First year for diversity & inclusion open house similar to Brown. Opened new center for diversity & inclusion giving them a space on campus to host events. Voices of students heard to push for more diverse Dean of Graduate School. - Deficiencies: Committee created to change name of Woodrow Wilson school. Problem with retention, students don't currently feel we're a very diverse place. Yale - Jack - 2015 has a series of incidents, black woman turned away from Greek chapter, president sent email out at Halloween, etc. Lead to 1,000 marching on campus and making demands. Forced administration to do something. They have now committed money to improve the hiring process. - Initiatives: Each college is hiring a full staff of diversity and inclusion (deans, associate deans, etc.) Lots of activity (name changes) to tackle the issue. Senate created an ad hoc committee on diversity and inclusion which is now permanent. Serves as a liason between all the groups and hosts events. - Deficiencies: After racial address, how do we address all forms of diversity & inclusion. Extending programs to LGBTQ, socio-economic, etc. students. Difficult to force tenured professors to do anything thus focusing on recruitment practices. UChicago - - Initiatives: Staffed a member for diversity and inclusion on council. Collaborating with two different centers to give workshops. Started working with international students. - Deficiencies: Members of affinity groups don't colloborate. Trying to host summits to get the groups to work together. Questions to UPenn about how their diversity and inclusion training for TA's work. Interactive classroom that introduces concepts to the TA's and starts a discussion. Question to MIT about the One World One MIT program - providing representation where there wasn't previously (religous life, international, LGBTQ) on diveristy and inclusion subcommittee. Have a town hall at the graduate bar that talks about intersectionality. Finding that there a lot of false equivalencies and bringing everyone to the table. Encourage the exposure to different groups that you don't identify with.

Question about how certain universities got ahead of these initiatives without certain events precipitating them - Brown is historically liberal, although not perfect. Work to not double book events at the same time. Yale has an issue with the way tenured track professors work. Makes recruiting faculty of color difficult. Make sure that activism turns into advocy. Question about MIT's making diversity and inclusion part of faculty review - Push has to come from students. Trying to make students do surveys asking how their advisor is doing on diversity and inclusion. Not yet implemented but hopefully next year they can have results. Question about whether or not diversity and inclusion training is mandated for all students at some universities - Generally no, some schools depends on the college. Required Title IX training but some universities has no checks and balances.

Mental health – Notes by Nick Williams, UChicago Wendy (Yale): Good services. Not adequate, but good comparatively across nation. All students part of plan. Soft 12 visit max/year at student health center. Staffing issues recently. Major complaint: so well utilized that wait times are long. Must wait max of 3 weeks after intake then get paired with clinician Brown: 2 reps on Saturdays just for graduate students mental health. Harvard: After 8 sessions transition to $35 copay. Full price after 40 visits. Princeton: Small facility. Space limitation to staff #s. Will send off-site immediately if student has significant need. Princeton-only network (new initiative). Some therapists were charging high prices because Princeton uses Aetna, and clinicians wouldn’t see Aetna patients. Penn: Soft 10 visit cap, always accept walk-ins. For in-network visits $10 copay. Some out of network providers negotiated with students to get $35 copay. 10% utilization, half that of undergrads. Started offering sessions at different schools. Added Saturday hours and evening hours (2 days a week). Don’t provide continuity of care, forces students to stop seeking care. UChicago: Let’s Talk. Reaching out to underutilized groups (international students, grads in general) MIT: Conflict management resources. Brown also has peer-to-peer counseling. UChicago Peer Health Advocates (college dorms) Columbia: Different levels of coverage depending on department (Gold vs Platinum). More difficult to visit Student Health Clinic. Hard for people to get their foot in the counseling door. Princton: ACA advocacy over concerns with changes to coverage (birth control, etc) Yale: Under ACA needed to join Rx coverage with Health and Specialty. Didn’t get a raise to cover. ACA changes will not affect anything. Harvard: Gave lower than average pay increase, changed Rx coverage. Depression meds increased by $100s. Cornell: Opt-out fee Some schools don’t cover health insurance if you run out of funding. Depends on if PI is paying partially for insurance or if the department covers. Discussion of different schools covering funding for PIs that run out of money, students that stay past their limit, etc How to handle students staying forever? MIT: Department will stop funding after 5 years (math). More lenient in other departments Yale: Students linger Diversity in counseling services/perception of services

MIT: Struggles to get people in because of stigma Yale: Not many issues. Hard to get the word out that services are good. How to improve mental health generally on campus? Penn: GAPSA has free workout classes + meditation. 4-5 workout classes Princeton: How to combat being shamed into not seeking services? Educate faculty on warning signs. Advisers take training courses and made aware of available resources Yale: How to approach PIs and break old habits? Guidebook of student-faculty relationships Cornell: Best practices for fac-student relationships. Setting groundrules from both perspectives Columbia: Contractual agreements. Not effective

Collaboration Relationships with administrators –Notes by Aislinn Rowan, Brown

Yale GSA: o Meet every other week with dean of grad school and a lower dean

General concerns, ongoing projects o For big projects: come up with comprehensive report and present the report to them

Then work with to iron out details, make a plan, etc. Helps when you can give them ideas to make the numbers work Or can make a really strong case to invest in important initiatives

o Good relationship generally Foundational in establishing grad student council

o Significant unionization effort which is not popular among graduate students Grad school is happy when GSA accomplishes things because it pulls power from

unionization group o Collaborating between multiple advocacy groups is helpful in accomplishing what you

alone cannot o Daylong conference of alumni who come back to a “where do I go from Yale” day

essentially a career/networking day

Cornell o Meetings

Meet monthly with dean of grad school Meet bimonthly with dean of students, also text him Meet monthly or every other with student life and university relations Meet with student trustee Once per semester meet with President, one private and one in front of

assembly o Biggest issue: response of “we don’t have the funds for that” o Administrations are generally receptive to having meetings with admins, even ones

without a history of meetings o Have upward and outward-facing reps with different members of the board

Upward interfacing with administration more “polite” Outward interacting with community more “aggressive”

o Community lunches with students RSVP for amount of food but no cap for attendance

o Sometimes threaten to do own surveys if the admin won’t let then see results

Dartmouth o Top-heavy admin decisions

Most decision making at President and Provost level Good relationship with deans in graduate school but they don’t actually control

the very fixed funding Many policy decisions happen without grad students in mind Trying to get on radar of provost-level decisions Dartmouth’s current president is deeply unpopular and the provost very

recently resigned

3 years ago hard alcohol ban for all students, faculty, etc.

Pushing anti-fraternity, anti-Greek drive which is main social scene for undergrads

Trying to build relationships with admins behind the scene who will probably still be there throughout admin changes

Currently trying to get grads on the search committees for high-level positions o Undergrads wrote op-eds last year to disband grad students, because it “takes away

from undergrad focus” But at least undergrad gov’t generally receptive when they meet

o Business school operates pretty independently, would like to collaborate with them Good relationship with medical school

o Easy to get data owned by grad school but difficult if owned by institution o Admin reluctant to put things in writing coming up with creative arguments about

why what is good for grad students is good for the institution o Partially because there aren’t “years” in the same way that undergrads, law, med school

have o For long term initiatives, need to get in early at the budget level

Sometimes working group will never connect with budget

Yale GP is a bit less collaborative than Yale GSA o They walk a line between antagonistic and collaborative

Push for things but also recognize they can’t just yell all the time o President and provost come to special meetings to talk about state of school

Q&As o Have meetings all the time o Sitting on ideals can be useful

Make administration make a statement on what they want to do for graduate students, and then you can keep holding them to it as long as you need to as leverage

o Has VP of student life Push for positions where it’s someone’s job to talk to you

o Need positive reinforcement when they do things that are good for graduate/professional students

MIT o Similar “fine line” to Yale GP o Senior house debacle

Administration didn’t really explain themselves and GSC stepped up and took a lot of the flak

Administration realized they owned GSC a bit o More recently, students working with city council

Administration realized that the students had a lot of power, to actually stop initiatives

A little less grateful now, but hopefully maintained relationship throughout this process

o Good relationship on diversity and inclusion o Leverage powerful alumni to get data or push administration to do things

Brown o Topics very ad hoc o Also do ad hoc surveys and incentivize with school memorabilia

Stuff that students want but won’t spend the money on themselves Also helps to advertise Brown grad school

o We don’t have a very engaged grad alumni community

o Provost is best relationship for us because he controls the money Best administrator to actually get stuff done

Columbia o Fireside chats with president where people can ask whatever they want o Neutered GSAC somewhat because sometimes students will just circumvent the council

and go right to the top

Princeton o Had a recent housing blowup because the new students didn’t know how the system

worked o Has led them to be a little bit more open with their data o Compiled report and presented it to assembly

Section about what the University is supposed to do Housing summit with everyone involved in housing to get things moving

GAPSA o Funding guarantee is less than the average time to completion o System is so big and complicated that data is supposed to trickle down but it often gets

caught somewhere Departments don’t talk to each other But then you can’t get people to make decisions without that data that you

can’t get…circular problem

Harvard o Business, law, and undergrads have most alumni

Also Kennedy school of government

Can audit classes in exchange for consulting/speaking/etc Regional connections very strong

Issue with many people: o Make a task force or working group, momentum runs down, it falls apart repeat this

process every few years Need to be accountable

MIT threaten with city council

Yale threatens to tell disseminate their unhelpfulness via bulk email o Bring things up to administration, they say “yes that’s a problem, you should work on

that” But we aren’t paid, and we are all trying to finish our degrees, etc.

Relationships with alumni – Notes by German Hernandez (MIT), typed by Darcy Frear (Harvard) Intro and level of engagement Princeton – limited relations, want to improve Alumni association send letter Professional development and careers trying to set networking UPenn – Penn Alumni Associations monopoly undergrad focused GAPSA trying to develop alumni network (network professional development and fundraising) Mixer with Columbia Email contact list. External affairs does alumni development Reunion days, homecoming subsidized tickets Yale – personal opinion no interaction Unsure about grad government level MIT – MIT Alumni Association. Included with campus events Infinite connection centralized database contact alumni MIT Career Services Alumni Advisor Hub speak Engagement happens at department level MIT is grad focused centralized MIT AA Harvard – similar to MIT, database, contact info Engagement, alumni hangouts, global events Department specific some programs, mentoring. Bring alumni to conference Relations with alumni office host alumni events Some schools have stronger database resistance to crossover different criteria Dartmouth – Great for undergrads, not many grad students Want to start a network lunches with alums career paths Externships run by admins Many things in place Cornell – no alumni affairs from GPSA yes from departments Focused on undergrads Could develop centralized network, but takes time and effort Columbia – not great for grads or undergrads Alumni association turn over, not responsive keep centralized Little to nothing on grad perspective Mixer start relationship Events this year: virtual alumni hour some departments and industry, not mentor or job Need to start with current students to build alumni relations Student specific is networking and seminars TEDx alumni, video presentation, online – 30 signups form department Yearly event, alumni weekend Establish connections through departments

Global networks – nation-specific groups, Chinese association for example Connections, trips, pre-orientation at different countries Get donations from networks Grad alumni of John Hopkins – very good outreach, calls, emails, events, follow-ups Alumni email – some do, some don’t (5/10) NYU, Penn, MIT, Princeton Leverage the network to grad students, who often don’t find alumni useful before job hunting Alumns want to give back, don’t know how Position in council with alumni title (3/10) Penn – global community, alumni forever, trying to develop internal alumni from student council. History, perspective, inspire

Unionization – Notes by Christopher Carroll, Dartmouth Harvard’s round-up

• No working group: Dartmouth, MIT

• Some sort of group: Princeton, U Penn, Cornell, Brown (A.F.T.)

• Working group:

• U Chicago - vote, 70% turnout (65% support)

• Columbia - 70% support

• AFT, AAUP, UAW

Yale: Feb 8/9 in favor Harvard: Still debating *All institutions appealing at federal level Discussion Harvard

• Teaching/Research, TA/RAs Yale

• Current teaching (Physics Dept, 2nd vote) Local 33

• Union organizing committees are harassing students (Cornell, Yale)

• AFT workers Yale:

• students are given paid leave to work for union organizing committee

• Senate are neutral to Local 33

• GSA against organizing committee tactics and adopted voting procedure (specifically the departments voting individually)

Princeton

• not constitutionally allowed to provide support for unionization Columbia

• student workers entering labs

• GSAC keep relationships, stay neutral, admin and unionization opinions in their newletter Dartmouth

• is the entering of labs and harassment a safety & security issue?

• general answer: this is considered “organizing against the union,” which is prohibited Columbia

• December: majority “yes”

• appealed by Columbia on grounds of voter intimidation

• Journalism student was documenting the process

• Columbia argues this was a cover up for voter intimidation U Chicago

• judge recused for conflict of interest (similar instance at Columbia)

• appealed/challenged the right to unionize (also at U Penn) Harvard

• new election because 500 students were not on voter list

• this decision would have a nationwide effect: employer voter lists for unions Yale

• union organizers are harassing first year students: “we’ll leave you alone if you sign this union card”

• cannot get union card back: “they were lost” Princeton

• union organizers are telling students they have the possibility to bargain on graduate housing Yale

• decisions made by people in unions without input (e.g., how to vote, how to proceed)

• hunger strike organized without a vote, without student input

• union organizers claiming childcare and sexual harassment issues can be handled by the union Brown

• SUGSY: more like “activist org,” not “advocacy org”

• they are not transparent and are hostile

• obtained and used personal emails: no knowledge/record of the number of students that actually participated in vote

Princeton

• proposes Ivy+ Unionization document

• so much misinformation (sometimes seen as beneficial to union organizers)

• we want to educate graduate students on actual facts

• when Princeton works with admin to disseminate facts about union promises, they are considered “working for the admin” and labeled as the enemy

• a document from the Ivy+ might prevent such labels as it is multi-institutional Yale

• town hall

• union efforts: rebuked facts and clarification

U Penn

• town hall

• attended by union members, anti-unionization advocates, and admin

• it was a beneficial meeting and they all parties agreed on one thing: “we never want to share a stage with each other ever again”

U Chicago

• town hall

• faculty, both pro/anti union

• University labor lawyer present

• PROTIP: do not record such meetings: anti-union advocates/admin will not speak their minds because incorrect statements can be used against them in court (similar to “organizing against the union”)

Brown

• planning “union facts” town hall

• no big anti-union group on campus

• admin not helpful: they do not want to seem partial

• poll SUGSY and admin prior to meeting

• project questions/answers from SUGSY/admin at town hall Harvard

• admin: too many unknowns to say anything concrete Princeton

• has a group on campus (something like) “union facts group”

• purpose of group somewhat unclear; so name change: “Grads against unionization”

• wants a debate

• all sides at Princeton have so far remained collegial Brown

• majority of students do not know union points

• recently acquired dental plan, raise for humanities $600 (summer fund)

• potential question: what would a union be fighting for? (things seem pretty good) Princeton

• GSC now prohibited from issues that union might be addressing

• possible path: use unionization front to argue admin for change (i.e., a vote could get stronger so deal with issues to diffuse this scenario)