Harvard's graduate student employees say they are too content, focused to organize

As increasing numbers of graduate students across the country have gathered and organized in the past three years, Harvard's graduate students have remained remarkably silent.

Some attribute the calm to general apathy, others to better working conditions for teaching fellows (TFs) and research assistants, but the Harvard scene appears relatively unique as unrest spreads at both private and public institutions.

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, part-time faculty and graduate student instructors do more than half of all teaching in American universities--shrinking the job market for newly-minted Ph.D.s and putting the teaching burden on lower paid and less experienced teachers.

Yet since the 1970s, Harvard's graduate students have made no move towards collective bargaining.

"Unfortunately, grad students at Harvard are not extremely active," says J. Gregory Foster, president of the Harvard Graduate Council, a group composed of students in all the University's graduate programs. "Most are committed to getting work done and getting out."

But other graduate student officers, like Ian A. Richmond, incoming president of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences' (GSAS) Graduate Student Council (GSC), say relatively good conditions for TFs make organizing unnecessary.

When the Grass Isn't Greener

Part of the calm in Cambridge may be attributable to the fact that Harvard graduate students do not have to face some of the concerns that ignited graduate students on other campuses across the country.

Not only do Harvard's graduate students workers have salaries and benefits far better than those of their counterparts at large state schools, but they outrank even those at comparable private institutions.

"Compared to Yale, we're heavenly," says Carlos Lopez, the current president of the Graduate Student Council (GSC). "Historically, we haven't had the kind of problems that Yale has had. It could be better but it's not oppressive."

Unlike Yale students, who fought for insurance and other fringe benefits beginning in the early 1990s, Harvard's grad students have insurance figured into their tuition costs.

Unpaid teaching requirements are sometimes a requirement of some departments at Yale, according to a report released last month by the Graduate Employees and Students Organization at Yale.

At Harvard, Lopez says, teaching is considered part of the financial aid package, which is unusually generous at the University.

More than 85 percent of GSAS students receive financial support from Harvard or other sources, and the $13,000 salary for a half-time teaching fellow is well over Yale's figure.

Although Harvard graduate students say they sympathize with their cohorts at other institutions who decide to unionize, they say there is really no need at the University.

"I understand that graduate students at other universities feel that this is the only way in which they can get their grievances heard, but I would certainly prefer to keep relations with the Harvard administration on a friendlier level," Richmond says.

He emphasized that unionization is a last resort, and labor matters at Harvard do not require this tactic.

The last move towards unionization by Harvard graduate students occurred in the 1970s. The movement was deflected when Harvard agreed to improve the financial aid system, according to Woolf.

Since a relatively minor 1991 debate over income tax withholdings from teaching fellows' pay, graduate students have not vocally questioned labor conditions.

Instead, graduate students and the GSC have focused on improving the advising and the financial aid system.

Although Lopez acknowledges the difficulty of standardizing and improving the advising system, he stresses its importance.

"It's something that needs to be done," he says. "At the core [advising] is a relationship between two people. You can't legislate to make sure a relationship between two people is run in a certain way."

Let's Talk It Through

Working conditions for TFs aren't bad at Harvard, but most grad students wouldn't call them perfect.

"There is a bit of a cultural attitude at some institutions that graduate students are expendable, that they are largely cheap labor for teaching and research," says former GSC President Adam Fagen.

And as for the labor activity at other schools, Fagen says it is not that the situation has worsened in the past few years, but rather that awareness of bad working conditions for graduate student instructors has increased.

"I guess it's hard to say if this has necessarily gotten better or worse, but there does seem to be more awareness of the issue now than there was a few years ago," he says.

And although Harvard's graduate students have not organized formal unions, the GSC and other graduate organizations represent their constituents' interests in negotiations with University officials.

GSC officers meet yearly with President Neil L. Rudenstine, Provost Harvey V. Fineberg '67 and other administrators, and have more frequent meetings with GSAS Dean Christoph J. Wolff.

In addition, Lopez says administrators are fairly open to the discussion of graduate student concerns.

"The channels of communication between the GSC and the administration have always been open to bring up concerns and address them," says Lopez, who is a graduate student in the Department of Sanskrit and Indian Studies.

In the past few years, graduate students have worked with the University over the past few years to improve the financial aid packages. Last spring, Harvard announced a restructuring of the financial aid system that guaranteed four years of funding.

The guarantee of teaching positions built into many of these financial aid packages will further improve the employment conditions for Harvard's graduate students.

Despite the success of the financial aid package, Fagen is quick to point out that graduate students are have no formal input in negotiating their compensation and terms of employment. The Faculty makes all the decisions.

"There is virtually no discussion between students and Faculty on these issues," he says. "While many students do seem reasonably happy with the situation, there is no guarantee that it will remain."

Apathetic or Content?

Others think that a lack of cohesiveness is the reason that Harvard graduate students have not organized.

"Because other schools--like Business, Kennedy, Divinity--operate as fiefdoms, there is little coordination of effort," says Foster, who is also a second year student at the Business School.

Foster sees the fractured nature of graduate student interests across schools and departments as a reason for the lack of labor activism at Harvard.

"The bulk of these students are not employees acting as research assistants or graduate teaching assistants and have very little interest in labor disputes of this sort," he says.

Foster advocates for the coordination, and perhaps, unionization, of graduate students through the GSC and GSAS across Harvard's many graduate schools.

"My feeling is that there is a need for a stronger coalition of students who are engaged in study and are also working for the University," he says.

Some graduate students say unification across or even within graduate schools could be difficult.

"Harvard graduate students are extremely self-focused, and that makes it hard to bring them together on any particular issue," says Elisabeth Laskin, the GSC representative for the History Department. "I don't mean this in a negative way, but simply that the nature of the academic world is one of self-promotion."

The administration says they have not noticed any signs that graduate students at Harvard are thinking of organizing.

"There has been no noticeable sign in recent years or now that indicates that unionization is a goal our students want to achieve," Wolff says. "Nevertheless, there are always reasons to be vigilant."

Wolff attributes this relative calm to the good relationship between administrators and graduate students.

"We have a well-established consultation process and try to respond to students' concerns, whenever possible, swiftly and un-bureaucratically," he says.