Macalester Undergraduate Workers’ Union (MUWU) won a hard-fought victory at Macalester College, Saint Paul, Minnesota, on Feb. 26, when 87% of voters certified the union to represent them.
The vote came after two years of effort from student organizers, with the movement growing in its aim to include all college student workers. While MUWU celebrates its victory, there is still much to fight for. The stipulated election agreement between the union and the college excluded off-campus and stipend workers, an exclusion that MUWU seeks to remedy with continued efforts.
“After our landslide victory, we are working hard to prepare for bargaining and setting up a strong structure so the process goes as smoothly as possible,” said Eliot, who wished to go by his first name, a representative of MUWU. “The Twin Cities are a hub for labor organizing, so we have gotten much support from other labor unions as well as many alumni, Macalester faculty/staff, and neighbors.”
MUWU hopes to increase wages for student workers and give them more control over their workplace while requiring more transparency and better communication from management. “We are working on an affiliation vote for UAW [United Automobile, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers of America] as well as electing a bargaining committee,” Eliot continued. “We hope to train the bargaining committee over the summer and start bargaining next semester.”
Organizing under anti-labor Trump regime
Across the country, however, the increasing anti-labor sentiment of the current presidential administration is proving a significant challenge to student organizers. Of MUWU’s petition with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), Eliot said, “We were extremely careful with our decision to move forward with our NLRB petition, and I think we just made the safe time cutoff for private sector organizing. Before filing for an election, a group of us went into the NLRB office and asked many in-depth questions to experts there to determine what the right path was.”
In Worcester, Massachusetts, the Clark University Undergraduate Workers’ Union (CUUGWU), which initially submitted its petition to the NLRB around the same time as MUWU, has since withdrawn its case with the board.
Clark University administrators and their lawyers pushed back heavily against the students’ efforts and even challenged the 2016 Columbia decision that granted students at private institutions the right to unionize.
“Clark’s extreme stance left us no choice,” said Emily Wells, a representative for CUUGWU. “They explicitly threatened to appeal the Columbia 2016 decision, which established student workers’ right to unionize. Given the current state of the NLRB under the anti-labor Trump administration, we had to take this threat seriously.”
The NLRB has faced significant challenges since the beginning of the Trump administration, as the President removed board member Gwynne Wilcox from her position. Initially, this was deemed illegal by U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell in Washington, D.C.. Still, a divided appeals court recently ruled that President Trump can fire Wilcox and Merit Systems Protection Board member Cathy Harris.
According to Wells, Clark University is taking advantage of this fraught political climate in its dealings with the student organizers. “They didn’t target the Columbia 2016 decision when our graduate workers unionized in 2022, but now that the NLRB is under the influence of an anti-labor federal administration, they see an opportunity to challenge our rights,” Wells stated. “Recently, the administration has eliminated [diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI)] positions and cut several humanities programs, shifting toward a business model that prioritizes profit over student needs.”
CUUGWU has recently finished a ten-day strike, where more than 270 student workers collectively logged more than 3,300 hours on the picket line. This strike was supported by fellow students, faculty, community members, alumni, union members, and elected officials.
“It’s clear that there is widespread support for our cause, even if our administration refuses to acknowledge it,” said Wells. “They are doubling down on the harmful rhetoric that because we are students, we are not real workers and therefore we do not deserve the right to organize.”
Despite setbacks, organizers for MUWU and CUUGWU remain optimistic about student labor organizing and its impact across the country. “We are part of a movement that will go down in history,” said Eliot. “Every single student who will go through these schools will know what it feels like to be empowered through a union and to experience a fighting rank-and-file union. That’s something that every student will take with them for the rest of their lives.
“To other student labor organizations: you deserve to be treated as adults, with respect and trust that you are capable of achieving your goal. Do not settle with affiliates or mentors who treat you with condescension or attempt to take away your autonomy. You, as the workers, know best.”
Wells echoed this sentiment: “This fight is about much more than just student workers at Clark. Our university is actively denying our human right to organize, and its actions threaten the rights of tens of thousands of student workers across the country. We are outraged by this blatant union-busting, and we are committed to standing up not just for ourselves, but for workers everywhere who deserve the right to organize and to have a voice in their working conditions.”
If you would like to assist CUUGWU, you can email the Clark University administration and demand that they agree to card check neutrality. You can also donate to its mutual aid strike fund by visiting linktr.ee/cu.ugwu.
For more information on MUWU, visit https://muwu.org/.
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