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> And from the student perspective, the recent votes at places like Chicago to unionize (and, more importantly, the justification provided by the student groups
by 4bpp 9y ago
> And from the student perspective, the recent votes at places like Chicago to unionize (and, more importantly, the justification provided by the student groups that organized those votes)
I'm at a school that underwent a grad student unionisation drive, and pretty much everything that the union proposed would have amounted to further empowering the administration at the expense of the academics (e.g. introducing new mediator officials with extensive compulsive power over advisors if their students should feel wronged in one way or another, hiring more staff to enforce diversity-friendly admissions and hiring outcomes, ...). At least the politicised end of the student body seems to consider the administration, rather than the academics, to be their natural ally.
- throwawayjava 9y agoThis is debatable and its own rabbit hole that is beat to death on other recent stories. But anyways, I understand the point, and this is why I stated: > and, more importantly, the justification provided by the student groups that organized those votes
- 4bpp 9y agoI'm sorry that I can't provide more details or evidence (lest I leak bits of identifying information), but as far as I can tell, our union has not made any statement to the effect of considering excessive administrative power or even bloat an issue.
- sjg007 9y agoAn incompetent advisor can ruin a promising grad student.
- 4bpp 9y agoWhether the union position on who should be empowered here has merit is orthogonal to the question of whether unions are broadly for expanding or reducing administrative power, no?
- sjg007 9y agoYour argument is simplistic and over generalizing... but it is a good example of the ideological battles we see in society. You’d probably find high demand that would justify the hiring of support staff to represent students vs faculty and vs admins in many cases. Whether this expands or decreases an administration is irrelevant. The goal of unionization is a collective voice that is acknowledged.