by Kyle Davidson

Graduate student employees gathered Friday on the steps of the Rackham Graduate School at the University of Michigan to celebrate the ratification of their new contract, following a five-month-long strike.

The Graduate Employees Organization (GEO) American Federation of Teachers Local 3550 announced on Friday that 97% of its members voted in favor of ratifying the new contract.  Graduate workers are set to return to work on Monday at the start of the new semester. 

The union represents about 2,300 graduate student instructors and graduate student staff assistants at the university. While members reached a tentative agreement with the university on Tuesday, voting to ratify the contract was open from Tuesday until midnight on Thursday. 

At Friday’s event, GEO members celebrated contract wins, including annual salary increases for Ann Arbor campus employees totaling 20% over the next three years, harassment and discrimination protections for all workers, a co-pay cap for physical therapy, expanded gender affirming care, a $20,000 emergency fund for international student workers, and 12 weeks of parental leave. 

“If our members choose to become parents, they now can, knowing that they’ll receive the same amount of parental leave as faculty on this campus,” said Amir Fleischmann, GEO Local 3550’s press liaison. “International workers now know they have access to a dedicated emergency fund should they need to travel home for an unexpected reason. Those lacking family wealth can now come to Ann Arbor to do a Ph.D., knowing that they’ll receive a living wage for the duration of their funding packages.

“Our transgender colleagues now have better access to life-saving gender affirming care,” Fleischmann continued. “And workers experiencing harassment and discrimination now have access to the funding they need to escape these dangerous abusive situations which remain all too common at this institution.”

However, GEO members noted their work was not over, saying they would continue to fight for equal pay for graduate employees at U of M Flint and Dearborn, as well as a living wage for master’s students and protections for GEO member’s right to strike. 

“The contract is just setting a new floor, where we will continue to build power and fight for those who got the shorter end of the deal,” said Garima Singh, a fifth year Ph.D. candidate and member of the union’s bargaining team. 

GEO members also welcomed the university’s commitment to an unarmed non-police emergency response program, and outlined its own criteria for the program. 

“The emergency response program must first be independent of the [U of M] Division of Public Safety and Security,” said Alejo Stark, a founding member of the GEO Local 3550’s abolition caucus.

Stark continued, saying the “program must have a decision-making body made up by directly impacted community members,” be “fully and sustainably funded,” and be “based in foundational values of consent and self-determination.”

In a statement issued after the contract’s ratification, Provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs Laurie McCauley said the contract’s ratification would assure a smooth start to the next academic year. 

University President Santa J. Ono also thanked GEO and university bargaining teams for their persistence.

“These teams never gave up on finding a way to reach agreement on a new three-year contract,” Ono said in a statement. “This contract allows U-M to stand out among our peers and it is a contract that truly benefits our outstanding graduate student workers.”