For Graduate Workers
On May 1-2, 2024, an election was held to determine whether the United Auto Workers (UAW) would represent a unit of Penn graduate and professional students. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) counted the ballots on Friday, May 3, 2024, and announced that a majority of the students who participated in the election voted in favor of union representation. The NLRB certified these election results on May 13, 2024.
The bargaining unit includes all graduate and professional students who provide research or instructional services for the University in Philadelphia, including those who serve as Teaching Assistants, Teaching Fellows, Research Assistants, Research Fellows, Pre-Doctoral Trainees, and Student Workers.
Excluded from the unit are the following:
- Students pursuing professional degrees in the Veterinary School, the Dental School, and the Medical School with the exception of professional students in those programs who are pursuing a joint degree and who qualify for inclusion by virtue of their research or instructional service for the University in conjunction with their other graduate or professional program;
- Educational Fellowship Recipients*;
- Guards;
- Supervisors; and
- All other employees.
*There is an unresolved question as to whether Educational Fellowship Recipients in lab rotations in the first year of the Biology PhD Program and the first and second years of the Biomedical Graduate Studies PhD Program are included in, or excluded from, the bargaining unit. All other Educational Fellowship Recipients are excluded.