Studying at a university that experienced the longest adjunct professor strike in the country’s history, receiving constant emails about contract bargaining, and hearing talk of new unionization drives has made unions a common conversation on campus.
Despite the familiarity with which students talk about them, the language surrounding them can be confusing. Here’s a quick explainer of the university’s unions.
What is a union?
A union is a group of employees who organize together to negotiate better working conditions with their employer. They hold meetings to collectively bargain with their employer to negotiate their contracts, allowing them to better advocate for fair wages, safe working conditions, and workplace protections. In the United States, a union must be formally recognized by the National Labor Relations Board.
There are many large nationwide unions, including the United Auto Workers Union (UAW) and Service Employees International Union (SEIU). But, when people refer to a “local” union, they are referring to a smaller — usually region or city-specific — chapter of one of these larger national unions.
What is a unit?
A unit, or bargaining unit, is a group of employees who bargain for and share a contract together. Each unit can be thought of as a distinct mini-union within the larger local union.
Unions at The New School
Nine units under five different local unions bargain with the university for their contracts. Below, each local union is as a subheading and each bargaining unit is numbered one through nine.
Academics Come Together-United Auto Workers Local 7902 represents nearly 4,000 workers at The New School. It is the largest union on campus.
The union has three units that represent employees at The New School.
1. New School Part-Time Faculty: The first ACT-UAW unit at The New School; it has represented part-time professors, except those at The School of Jazz and Contemporary Music, since 2005.
2. Student Health Employees at The New School (SHENS): Employees at the university’s Student Health Services, including therapists, counselors, nurses, social workers, and physicians, have been represented by SHENS since 2018. Their contract expired on June 30, and they are currently bargaining with the university.
3. Student Employees at The New School (SENS): Since 2017, SENS has represented all academic student workers at the university. This includes Course Assistants, Research Assistants and Associates, Teaching Assistants and Fellows, and Tutors. Their contract expired on Aug. 31 and they are also currently bargaining with the university.
Those classified as non-academic student workers, who hold positions in the Making Center, as Resident Advisors, and more, are the one of the only groups of employees on campus not unionized. Those organizing the New Student Workers Union, (NewSWU), are working to change that. If their current unionization campaign is successful, non-academic student workers will merge with SENS.
4. American Federation of Musicians Local 802 represents 130 part-time faculty members at The School of Jazz and Contemporary Music. The chapter has been on campus since 1998.
There are two units represented by Local 1205 at The New School.
5. Since 1980, Teamsters Local 1205 Clerical has represented clerical employees, such as office staff and librarians on campus.
6. The “Professional” unit of the union (Teamsters Local 1205 Professional) has represented employees who work in Student Accounts, Student Success, and Financial Aid departments, as well as some advising, administrative, and technical roles since 2016.
There are two bargaining units under SEIU Local 32BJ at the university.
7. Security guards have been unionized under the Security unit of SEIU Local 32BJ since 1995.
8. Facilities, cleaning, and maintenance staff who have been unionized under the Maintenance unit of the same local union since 1970.
9. The university’s engineers have been unionized under IUOE Local 94 since 2013.
While SENS and SHENS are currently the only bargaining units working under expired contracts and bargaining for new ones, other units on campus will be entering bargaining sessions in the coming months.
In the Teamsters union, the Clerical unit’s contract is up on June 30, 2024 and the Professional unit’s contract is up on Dec. 31, 2026. The SEIU Local 32BJ’s contracts will be up on Dec. 31, 2023 and June 30, 2026 for the maintenance and security unit respectively, and the contract held by New School engineers represented by IUOE Local 94 will be up on Dec. 31, 2026. The part-time faculty represented by ACT-UAW Local 7902’s contract will be up on Aug. 31, 2027 and the part-time jazz faculty’s contract will be up on June 30, 2028.
Wild that you guys forgot to mention the full time technicians that work at the Making Center. You mfs wouldn’t get 75% of your assignments done without them yet they’re so conveniently forgotten when talking about union workers at the New School.