Mizzou graduate students petition to unionize
The fight for racial equality at the University of Missouri Columbia has been in news headlines for weeks, but Mizzou graduate students are working to push their movement back in the spotlight.
Graduate students hosted a Forum on Graduate Rights rally at Traditions Plaza on the Mizzou campus to collect signatures to form a labor union through the Missouri National Education Association.
The protests started after Mizzou announced in August it would no longer cover health insurance for graduate students due to an interpretation of the Affordable Care Act.
After complaints from students and Missouri politicians, Chancellor R. Bowen Loftin agreed to reinstate graduate students health care. However, on November 9th, Loftin announced he will resign his position as Chancellor at the end of the year due to administrative reasons.
Doctoral degree student, Sarah Senff, who is the co-chair of the Action Committee for the Forum on Graduate Rights, Sarah Senff, said Loftin made a promise he can no longer keep and the group is fighting for a contract that will give them their rights back.
“We lost and were temporarily restored our health care coverage at the beginning of the year,” Senff said.“We were recently issued a personal promise by Chancellor Loftin that we would have ongoing coverage but now that he is leaving that position at the end of the year, a promise doesn’t really mean much to us anymore.”
The Forum on Graduate Rights group at Mizzou has worked closely with a campaign organization called the Coalition of Graduate Workers. Senff said the two groups have not been able to reach an agreement on wages with the university.
Forum Leader and doctoral degree student in the Department of History, Connor Lewis, told the crowd of students that this is not the first or last labor fight the U.S. will have.
“An injury to one is an injury to all and this is something that I personally firmly believe and it’s something that labor movements in the United States of America have believed since its founding in the 19th century,” Lewis said.
The Forum on Graduate Rights group needs to collect 2,000 signatures in order to hold a vote on the issue. The group hopes to have a finalized contract in place by 2016.
“We need a contract that will ensure that our health care coverage that we were promised when we got here continues,” Senff said. “And that we will have the graduate housing and the tuition waivers and that we will have no graduate student earning at or below the poverty line.”
An original member of Concerned Student 1950, Maxwell Little told the crowd of people that each group will need to work together.
“We must continue this unity and continue our unified voice for justice and equality for all students on this campus, not just students of color,” Little said.
