What GSWs and Postdocs won so far

As the bargaining teams reach a Tentative Agreement (TA) on each article, no further changes are made until Graduate Student Workers (GSWs) and Postdocs (PDs) vote on the full TA’d contract at the end of the bargaining process. Below are explanations of the Tentative Agreements.

HEALTH AND SAFETY

WHAT WE WON

The current Tentative Agreement requires the Institute and Union Members to comply with all health and safety laws and policies for on-campus work and institute sponsored off campus work. No unit member will be required to work in conditions that endanger their health and safety. Unit members must report unsafe conditions, and cannot be retaliated against for doing so.

Furthermore, the Institute is required to provide 

        • Personal protective equipment
        • First aid equipment and training
        • Timely health and safety information to workers assigned to offsite workspaces (e.g. field research), allowing workers to plan for hazards in the field 
        • Workers’ compensation to injured workers as required by law
        • The right for a health and safety sub-committee of GSWs and PDs to liaise with other health and safety committees on campus. 

WHY IT MATTERS

Accessibility and Accommodations

WHAT WE WON

Under the current Tentative Agreement, Workers may request reasonable accommodations for a disability or pregnancy related condition from the Caltech Accessibility Services for Students (Graduate Student Workers) or Disability & Leave Administration Unit (Postdocs).

Workers requesting accommodations are entitled to: 

      • A timely, good faith interactive process to provide accommodations.

      • The right to request a meeting to discuss their accommodations need.

      • Confidentiality of all medical documentation

      • The right to use prior documentation for past accommodations in accommodations requests

      • If an accommodation request is denied, a written explanation of why the request was denied.

If the interactive process fails to provide adequate accommodations, workers have the right to appeal; once the appeal process is exhausted or 21 days have elapsed from the initial denial, a worker who believes their accommodations request has been unreasonably denied may file a grievance using our new process in the Prohibition and Procedures Against Discrimination, Unlawful Harassment, and Abusive Conduct article.

WHY IT MATTERS

“When I sought disability accommodations my first year at Caltech, I contacted CASS (Caltech Accessibility Services for Students) and they asked me to schedule an appointment through their automated form. On the day of my appointment, I waited outside the door for 45 minutes and called the office a few times with no response. By chance, someone from the Chancellor’s office walked by and only after he made a few calls and emails, we found out that the last CASS administrator had left his position and the new one hadn’t started. In the end, it took until halfway through my second year to get accommodations. Some of my friends with much more severe disabilities and medical conditions had to wait equally long or longer to have their needs met. A strong union contract, mandating timely responses to accommodation requests, would ensure students get the help they need while they still need it.”

– A GSW in Physics

Freedom of Speech and Expression

WHAT WE WON

This article enshrines:

The California Labor Code, Sections 1101-1104 on political speech and activity

WHY IT MATTERS

Earlier this year, Caltech made unilateral amendments to the campus free speech policy. These changes would have affected our ability to organize events like the Majority Rally last faall and more recently, the We Keep Us Safe rally. . Through collective action, student workers at Caltech fought to preserve our academic freedom and our right to union activity and broader political organizing at Caltech. Protections under the California Labor Code are the strongest protections for any private or public university, setting an institutional standard for worker protections at Caltech. Going forward Caltech has agreed to notify our union before they make any changes to the campus “Freedom of Speech and Expression Policy” that would affect the clauses of the Free Speech Tentative Agreement. 

When Caltech changed its policies, events such as our majority rally would have been prohibited under Caltech’s Policy. This contract marks a new period of academic freedom at Caltech.

Union Access

WHAT WE WON

This Tentative Agreement ensures reasonable access to campus to enforce the contract and inform all GSWs and PDs of their rights under our contract, including:

  • Use of campus bulletin boards, campus mail, Caltech email, and Caltech Zoom
  • Use of campus facilities for union activities
  • A 30 minute union orientation slot at campus-wide orientation
  • Access to contact information of all GSWs and Postdocs provided at the beginning of the year
  • Union stewards, elected from the GSW and Postdoc body, are guaranteed the right to enforce the contract and reasonable time to bargain successive contracts

WHY IT MATTERS

This week, Caltech administration sent an email to all GSWs regarding requests for information (RFIs) made by your elected bargaining representatives. RFIs put us on equal footing with the Caltech administration by ensuring that the same data is available to both bargaining teams. This Tentative Agreement regarding Union Access follows the same logic by allowing your union access to campus resources. The Union Access article gives all of us the ability to enforce our contract and build power for the next.