We met with the Rockefeller administration on Wednesday for our second bargaining session
On Wednesday, UPROR-UAW had our second negotiation session with the Rockefeller administration. We entered this meeting with a set of initial proposals based on the SPOC-UAW contract from Mount Sinai postdocs. The purpose of this is to help quickly reach a contract that meets and exceeds the highest standards from institutions across New York City. The set of articles included and the result of the discussions is below:
Purpose – Establishes the entities who are party to the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) and an agreement between us on who is included in the bargaining unit covered by the CBA.
Outcome – We reached an agreement on standard unit definition language as defined by our NLRB certification. We will continue discussions at our next session to hopefully reach a tentative agreement on this article.
Purpose – Establishes a committee consisting of UPROR-UAW members and Rockefeller administrators to implement and administer the contract.
Outcome – Rockefeller countered to decrease the number of UPROR-UAW and RU representatives and the frequency of the meetings. We believe our proposal of four representatives is reasonable and will ensure adequate representation of postdocs in these meetings. More frequent meetings will also position us to resolve issues proactively as they arise over the course of implementing and administering the contract.
Purpose – Establishes benefits for travel by members of UPROR-UAW. Payment for travel that is required or approved by a postdoc’s HoL will be provided through travel advances, direct travel funding, or timely reimbursement of expenses incurred, in accordance with the University’s Expense Reimbursement policy. Travel insurance will be provided in accordance with the University’s Travel and Accident Insurance policy.
Outcome – Rockefeller administration did not yet respond to this proposal.
Purpose – Ensures that if the law changes and any provision of the contract is found to be contrary to the new law, the rest of the contract would remain in effect. We would then renegotiate over the affected parts of the contract.
Outcome – We reached our first tentative agreement on Severability!
Our discussions with Rockefeller have been collegial with a shared goal of reaching a mutually beneficial contract quickly. We will continue to emphasize the importance of both meeting and exceeding the standards that have already been set by other New York City postdoc contracts. We still hope to use SPOC-UAW’s contract to expedite the bargaining process, and look forward to our next session on April 16th from 10:30 am to 1:45 pm. If you would like to observe the session, please let us know with this link.
In solidarity,
UPROR-UAW Bargaining Committee