Opinion: The UC strikes were justified

Anoushka Mekerira

Everyone remembers the chaos that came with classes being canceled in 2020. Many college students thought that would be behind them as they entered their 2022-23 school year. However, strikes at the University of California (UC) campuses have resulted in classes being canceled once again. Students like Abby Wong, a UC Davis freshman, are reliving this experience.

The recent UC strikes have been causing a shift in the California college education system as academic employees demand fair wages, better working conditions, and better funding. Although students' college education is at risk, many are in support of the strikes, justifying that academic employees deserve better. Wong is one of many UC students who had their classes canceled for the remainder of the year.

"My classes and lectures were all canceled for the rest of the school year in one class because the professor joined the strike in solidarity with the teaching assistants," Wong said.

The strikes lasted for several weeks in the fall of 2022 and garnered widespread support from students, faculty, and labor unions. Nearly 48,000 teacher assistants (TA), researchers, and other employees across the UC system's ten campuses participated in the strikes.

Although the cancelation of classes affected students' learning, the events brought attention to the ongoing struggle for worker rights in the higher education sector and sparked discussions about the role of universities in supporting their employees. This labor action could prove to be a turning point for graduate student workers nationwide, who have long been relied on by American universities for tasks such as grading exams and staffing labs for relatively low pay.

"With the lack of TAs in class, the professors had to change many grading methods. TAs are so beneficial in classes, so it is understandable that they desire more equitable compensation for their efforts," said Erin Kee, a freshman at UC San Diego.

The cost of living in California is already expensive enough, so this disparity disadvantages UC workers further, making it difficult to meet their basic needs. According to a report by the National Low Income Housing Coalition, a worker in California needs to earn $34.69 an hour to afford a modest two-bedroom apartment, while the average wage of UC workers is $20.57 an hour.

Additionally, the UC system has faced persistent underfunding from the state of California, leading to a decline in education quality and services. A study by the UC Berkeley Center for Labor Research and Education found that the state of California has underfunded the UC system by $2.5 billion since the 2008 recession. This lack of funding has resulted in increased class sizes, reduced course offerings, and a decrease in the availability of services for students.

"Most of my classes were canceled because of the strikes, but also, I didn't get back my grades at the end of the semester because there weren't any TAs to grade my papers," said Kaylene Lin, a freshman at UC Berkeley.

With the absence of TAs in her classes, Lin hopes that the striking will result in successful negotiations for better circumstances for academic work nationwide.

Following the strikes, the University of California system issued a statement acknowledging the "important and highly valued contributions" of its academic workers to its teaching and research objectives. The statement further claimed that the university had provided "fair responses" on various issues, including pay, housing, and work environment.

The future for UC academic employees holds an emphasis on the wages being revised, comparable to those at prestigious private universities such as Harvard, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and the University of Southern California, and among the top of the pay scale for public research universities. If the wages of the UC academic employees are not improved, all current and future students in the UC system will be affected. l