UMass Organizers Want Student Union

Student activists at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst are taking a novel approach to the problem of organizing a student body. In an attempt to institutionalize student power, they are trying to form a student union which would possess all the legal powers of a collective bargaining unit.

A group of students called the Student Organizing Project has provided the main impetus behind the unionization effort, drawing up the Student Union Enabling Policy and submitting the proposal to the UMass board of trustees.

"The basic idea of the policy is to serve as a labor relations act for students," Doug Phelps, a staff member of the organizing project, said Monday. "The policy would give UMass students the right to bargain collectively with the administration on all facets of university life," he added.

Under the terms of the student proposal, UMass students would form a union that would represent students in negotiations with the administration. According to Phelps, contracts agreed upon by the union and the administration would then be submitted to a vote of the entire student body for ratification.

The pioneering nature of the proposed policy lies in the binding effects of negotiated contracts. UMass officials could not unilaterally alter provisions of the contract without the union's consent. Thus, Phelps said, the practice of hiking tuition and abolishing programs by decree would come to an end.

The UMass administration is adopting a "wait-and-see" position on the issue of student unionization. "I don't think we have a position of being for or against it," said Robert W. Gage, vice-chancellor for student affairs at the campus.

"Our position is that we'd like to get more specific information about student unions," he said. "I'm not sure that a union could bring together a coalition of interests with the kind of diversity you find at a large university like UMass," he added.

The UMass student senate approved the policy last fall, and the bill at present lies in a committee of the board of trustees. Rep. James A. Collins (D-Amherst) introduced the legislative version of the policy into the Massachusetts House last week, and approval of the bill by the state legislature would eliminate the need for trustee approval.

The student unionization effort has intensified at the Amherst campus in recent months. UMass students elected student government co-presidents Ellen Gavin and Henry Ragin on a unionization platform last fall, and the organizing project has focused on organizing students into various councils centered on issues of dormitory housing, department curriculum and special interest groups.

The councils would form the basis of the union, according to Phelps, who said, "The union would serve as an infrastructure of the student councils, and policy recommendations would originate in these councils."

Some of the 12 councils in existence now have already obtained individual contracts with the university. The student nurses' council negotiated a contract with UMass officials last fall.

Gavin, a staff member of the organizing project and the student trustee representing the Amherst campus, said the project is working towards a goal of 25 councils before the formal creation of the union, scheduled for April.

The purpose of organizing the councils is to demonstrate the popularity of the unionization effort, Gavin said. "Approval of the union by the trustees depends on the strength of the organization," she said, adding, "recognition of the union on paper is meaningless unless you have a structure."