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THE HARVARD CRIMSON
NEWS
COMMENCEMENT 2023
LABOR
1,600 Sign Petition to Raise Student Wages A LIVING WAGE. The Harvard Graduate Students Union-United Automobile Workers called for higher student wages. BY CAM E. KETTLES CRIMSON STAFF WRITER
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the rent is too damn high and it just keeps going up,” HGSU-UAW organizer TomHenry J. Reagan said at the rally. “We are here because the wealthiest academic institution in history thinks it’s okay to tell its employees to go on food stamps.” Organizers from the Harvard Academic Workers campaign also spoke at the rally. HAW is attempting to unionize non-tenure-track academic workers and has been collecting union authorization cards since February, when they first launched publicly. “Asking for a living wage is not greedy, it’s not selfish, and it doesn’t undermine that commitment to what you do,” HAW organizer and Harvard Medical School postdoctoral fellow Morgan Gilman said. “We all know that the money is in the budget. They have no trouble finding the money when they’re writing their own paychecks. This is a matter of priorities,” Gilman added. Harvard President Lawrence S. Bacow earned more than $1.3 million in 2021, an increase of around $200,000 from what he made in 2020. Rally goers also criticized the University’s acceptance of the donation from Griffin, taking issue with his support of Republican politicians. Griffin donated nearly $60 million to Republican candidates during the 2022 midterm election cycle and has publicly supported Florida Governor Ron DeSantis for president in 2024, though DeSantis has not yet announced a presidential bid. Griffin has also contributed to Democratic politicians, including $500,000 to U.S. President Joe Biden’s inaugural committee. “We’re here because when a billionaire Republican sugar daddy wants to boost his ego, Harvard will happily oblige for a bargaining cost of $300 million,” said Reagan, a first-year Ph.D. student in Engineering Sciences. University President Lawrence S. Bacow has defended the school’s decision to accept Griffin’s donation and rename GSAS in his honor, adding that Harvard should not screen donors for their political affiliations. The HGSU-UAW petition states Harvard’s decision to accept Griffin’s donation “reinforces a long history of association with the billionaire class and per-
nicious anti-labor figures.” The letter criticizes Griffin for opposing teachers’ unions. In a February 2022 interview with billionaire David M. Rubenstein — a member of the Harvard Corporation, the University’s highest governing board — Griffin said he believes an important part of achieving the American Dream is “by having an on-ramp to education.” “And unfortunately, we’ve put a detour on that on-ramp in many parts of our country where the interest of the public sector unions dominates the rights of the children,” he said. The petition also condemns Griffin for his support of DeSantis, who it says “has built his national political profile off of ruthless attacks on queer and trans people.” In 2022, DeSantis signed a state law — referred to by many detractors as the “Don’t Say Gay” law — forbidding kindergarten to third-grade public school teachers from teaching about gender identity and sexual orientation. DeSantis has also opposed gender-affirming health care for transgender minors. In an April 12 statement to The Crimson, Jaquelyn M. Scharnick ’06, a spokesperson for Griffin, wrote that it is “patently false that Ken would in any way support viewpoint restriction as he has been one of the strongest supporters of free speech and free inquiry in the country.” “Ken said as recently as today that no one who contributes to a politician agrees 100% with their views and policy positions,” wrote Scharnick, a former Crimson News editor. “This is as true for Ken’s financial support of Governor DeSantis as it was for his backing of the campaigns of President Obama and Mayor Rahm Emanuel.” Per Forbes, Griffin has publicly backed DeSantis’ “Don’t Say Gay” law, saying that DeSantis has “a really important point of view.” Following the rally, recently elected HGSU-UAW president Evan C. MacKay ’19 led a march around Harvard Yard to deliver the petition to Massachusetts Hall. “We know that at the richest institution in higher education in the history of the world, Harvard can pay its workers a living wage,” MacKay said.
HGSU-UAW rally attendees march around Harvard Yard while chanting and banging drums in support of raising wages for student workers. BY CAM E. KETTLES—CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER
ore than 1,600 people have signed a petition calling on Harvard to raise student researcher and teacher salaries up to living wage in Middlesex County for members of the University’s graduate student union by July 1. On May 10, more than 100 graduate students rallied in Harvard Yard before delivering the petition to Massachusetts Hall. The petition, created by the Harvard Graduate Students Union-United Automobile Workers, began gathering signatures May 1. According to MIT’s Living Wage Calculator, the living wage for one adult with no children in Middlesex County is $23.45 per hour. Scaled to an annual salary, graduate students would need to make $48,779 to meet the living wage rate. HGSU-UAW’s petition comes in response to Harvard’s recent decision to name the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences after Kenneth C. Griffin ’89, a billionaire hedge fund CEO and Republican megadonor who donated $300 million to Harvard’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences. The petition states that graduate students “are kept in the dark about decisions to sell off parts of our university” and have no input about the use of the funds. University spokesperson Jason A. Newton declined to comment on the criticisms levied at the rally and in the petition. At the rally, organizers argued that the current yearly wage increase of 3 percent does not keep pace with the rising cost of living. “Harvard has failed to reach that rock bottom standard over and over and over again,” HGSU-UAW organizer Alexandra C. Stanton said at the rally. Speakers at the rally referenced a flier circulated by Harvard University Health Services encouraging graduate students to attend an informational meeting to “learn more about qualifying for SNAP benefits” as clearly demonstrating the need for higher wages. “We are united here because
Harvard and Endeavor Launch Leadership Training Platform
Grad Students Union Enters Arbitration Over Exclusion
Kara Hartig, a student at the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, leads a chant in front of Massachusetts Hall as rally attendees poster the door. BY CAM E. KETTLES—CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER
BY MILES J. HERSZENHORN CRIMSON STAFF WRITER
Endeavor and Harvard University announced the launch of Versity, a new online professional development learning platform, in a joint press release on May 2. Versity will officially launch in June with three courses that are each co-taught by a Harvard professor and a celebrity actor affiliated with Endeavor. Endeavor is a global sports and entertainment company based in Beverly Hills, California overseeing talent agencies, sports leagues, and brand marketing. Most notably, Endeavor maintains a controlling interest in the company that owns UFC and WWE, the premiere mixed martial arts and wrestling leagues. Harvard spokesperson Jason A. Newton wrote in an emailed statement Thursday that Versity is “a new opportunity for Harvard faculty to create high-quality short-form courses with new educational content for different types of learners whom Harvard faculty might not otherwise reach.” The new platform is geared toward companies that seek to provide their employees with educational opportunities to help them build leadership skills. Versity is a collaboration between Endeavor and Harvard’s
Office of the Vice Provost for Advances in Learning, a University administrative wing that focuses on online learning and innovations in education. The collaboration with Endeavor to establish Versity will allow professors to share their expertise in a manner that protects the intellectual property of the faculty member and Harvard, according to Newton. When Versity launches next month, three of Harvard’s most well-known professors will be the first on the platform. Government professor Michael J. Sandel and Michael B. Jordan will collaborate on a course about tech ethics; Harvard Law School professor Jody L. Freeman and Amy Poehler will co-teach a course titled “Purpose, Perspective, and Persuasion”; and University Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Cynthia Erivo will serve as the instructors of “How to Bring the Real You to Work.” Guy Schory, who serves as chief digital officer at Endeavor, said in the press release that Versity “combines results-driven pedagogy with world-class storytellers to bring a unique and engaging perspective to learning.” “By combining leading global minds, creative talent, and a dynamic, interactive technology platform, we are creating a whole new way to develop the leaders of tomorrow,” Schory added. Versity expects to unveil ad-
ditional courses throughout the rest of 2023, according to the press release. Harvard will use any proceeds it receives from the collaboration with Endeavor to support Versity’s course design and to reinvest in the University’s teaching and learning initiatives, according to Newton. Versity isn’t the University’s first online educational partnership. The initiative is similar to the $30 million collaboration between Harvard and MIT in 2012 that established edX, an online learning platform that allowed users to take digital courses from the two institutions for free. The virtual learning platform was sold in 2021 for $800 million to 2U, Inc., a Maryland-based education technology firm — though the company’s stock price has since plummeted. Gates said in the press release that he is “deeply honored” to be teaching one of Versity’s three inaugural courses. “Since Socrates, great teaching has always been characterized by great storytelling,” Gates said. “Working alongside the brilliant actor Cynthia Erivo, we thread a wide range of riveting narratives into the fabric of our pioneering course on social identity and cultural authenticity,” he added. miles.herszenhorn@thecrimson.com
BY CAM E. KETTLES CRIMSON STAFF WRITER
Harvard and its graduate student union have entered arbitration this month for a grievance filed by the union urging the University to include graduate students from its Department of Human Evolutionary Biology in the union. Harvard Graduate Students Union-United Automobile Workers, which initially filed the grievance on June 30, 2021, argues that the excluded HEB students perform research that contributes to the work of their principal investigator — and therefore conduct work that would be compensated under the contract. The group represented by the union includes all students who provide instructional services and who serve as research assistants, “regardless of funding sources, including those compensated through Training Grants,” according to Article 1 of the contract. Some HEB students receive a stipend, which counts as financial aid, but do not receive compensation. According to University spokesperson Jason A. Newton, students who are receiving a stipend only for financial aid and are not performing work for the University are not included in the union’s bargaining unit, and performing research for one’s academic work does not amount to providing a service for the University. In the presence of a mediator,
Harvard and the union will conduct arbitration hearings until October 2023, after which the mediator will make a decision about the grievance. During a May 10 rally in Harvard Yard, union leaders, including then-HGSU-UAW president Koby D. Ljunggren, attended the first arbitration meeting to dis-
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These student workers have no access to our benefit funds. Sal E. Suri
CEEC member
cuss the inclusion of HEB workers in the bargaining unit. HEB students first contacted the union’s Contract Enforcement and Education Committee, according to Sal E. Suri, a CEEC member and a third-year Ph.D. candidate in History of Science. “Despite doing the same work as other student workers in other science departments, they have been told they do not qualify to be in unit,” Suri said at the rally last week. “These student workers have no access to our benefit funds. They don’t have access to the collective security of our union. In response to this decision by the Harvard administration, CEEC has decided to fight this as much as humanly possible,” Suri said. Though the grievance was first filed in June 2021, both the University and its union had
cam.kettles@thecrimson.com
agreed to extend the timeline of the grievance process. In March 2023, a National Labor Relations Board official ruled that MIT graduate fellows cannot be included in MIT Graduate Student Union-United Electrical, Radio, and Machine Workers of America because fellows receive funding in exchange for their own academic work, not as compensation for work for MIT. According to Ljunggren, who is set to take on a part-time organizing position with HUWU and Graduate Employees of Northeastern University-United Automobile Workers, “Harvard’s attempts to exclude certain workers from our unit” include denying them the guarantee of a yearly raise. “Although the University has typically followed through on that promise of yearly raises, if people aren’t covered by the contract, there’s not really much of a guarantee,” they added. cam.kettles@thecrimson.com
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