NYU-AAUP routinely advocates for the collective bargaining rights of our fellow employees, even if we are not a bargaining unit. Today, we stand in support of the efforts of our colleagues at Adjuncts Come Together-United Auto Workers (ACT-UAW) Local 7902, to secure a fair contract for the union’s members. We regret that the NYU administration is putting unnecessary obstacles in the path of a just outcome to the negotiations. Adjunct instructors, always over-burdened, had a particularly rough time during the pandemic; most already faced
difficulties due to high costs of living in New York City, and many now are being pushed to precarity. Not only do adjuncts deserve the same one-time cost-of living “bonus” tenure-stream faculty received this summer, but they deserve general respect from the administration along with full recognition of the worth of their labor at NYU.
We are particularly dismayed to note that Local 7902 is the latest NYU employee union that has had to begin a strike authorization vote in order to possibly secure a contract from NYU. No union wants to ask this of their members, and it is always a last resort. Why does the NYU administration push bargaining to the brink so often? Such tactics not only are detrimental to the collegial ethos of respect for the labor and contributions of those who share our common workplace, but they also sow long-term distrust in the institution among all who work at NYU.
NYU-AAUP asks the faculty at large to support the ACT-UAW Local 7902 union in any way possible. In the event of a strike, we strongly advocate that all faculty resist any call to substitute their own labor for that of adjuncts in the matter of grading or teaching. We also urge the NYU administration to resolve the outstanding contract differences as soon as possible so that disruptions to student learning and to faculty livelihoods are avoided.
NYU-AAUP Executive Committee
- Rebecca Karl, Professor, History
- Paula Chakravartty, Associate Professor, Gallatin & Department of Media, Culture,
- and Communication
- Andrew Ross, Professor, Social and Cultural Analysis
- Anna McCarthy, Professor and Chair, Cinema Studies
- Mohamad Bazzi, Director of Kevorkian Center and Associate Professor of Journalism
- Fred Moten, Professor of Performance Studies and Comparative Literature
- Vasuki Nesiah, Professor of Practice, Gallatin
