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I got filled with righteous internet rage when I read the headline, but then I read the article. The particular strike was implemented by withholding fall grad
by antiterra 7y ago
I got filled with righteous internet rage when I read the headline, but then I read the article.
The particular strike was implemented by withholding fall grades, which seems to unnecessarily burden students who are to be buried under crushing debt, no? Also, they are apparently unionized and this strike was against the extant agreements.
The consequences of not getting a grade can affect a student’s entire career and ability to sustain themselves financially.
- datashow 7y agoSo the correct title should be: California university fired 54 grad students who withheld students' final grades Is firing sufficient for punishment?
- asdff 7y agoOnly they fired them because they were arrested for sitting in the road, not for failing to grade midterms.
- aaomidi 7y agoIt's like protests is meant to cause a disruption. I really have a terrible place in my heart for people who criticize protests because it caused a disruption. That's the point of a protest. I'm very happy for you that you've never felt the need to take these drastic steps, but they're protesting real issues and real problems they're having. The grades are ultimately the universities problem
- oh_sigh 7y agoIf me and my flat earth friends shut down the highway you need to take to work in order to protest the teaching of sphereism in schools, you wouldn't complain?
- refurb 7y agoProtesting by making the lives harder for your fellow students is just a dumb strategy. It doesn't hurt the administration, it hurts the students. Now the students are backing the administration!
- asdff 7y agoWhether or not it hurts the students is up to the administration. Professors can grade their own exams, as they do in many courses already. The university doesn't even have to dip into their own pockets, they can use federally subsidized work study labor if they were short on labor. However, by hurting students and adhering to draconian policies that serve to hurt more students, the school is paradoxically increasing support because the administration knows students are going to be enraged without looking into the nuance of why these things are happening to them, and who decides why these things should happen the way that they do.
- refurb 7y agoFrom what I’ve gathered, the exams were turned over to the grad students for grading. The school asked for the grades, the grad students refused. Has the school asked for the exams to be returned, so they could be graded? I don’t know. I assume the graduate students wouldn’t turn them over anyways.
- asdff 7y agoAnd again, this is brought upon by the university and their adherence to policies designed to strike the biggest wedge between the student body. I've had classes at my university where if you miss one exam your grade is averaged from all the rest. If the building that housed the exams was engulfed in flames and all the exams were lost, this is probably what the university would do in response. The university is free to make whatever rule they'd like to get around this, but instead go for maximum hurt to try to cut the legs off of this strike, and what is blowing me away is that this strategy by the university is working very effectively.
- refurb 7y agoWhat is the college doing with regards to the withheld grades? Even if they did average all my other work, I'd be pissed I put all that effort into something that has zero impact on my grade. You're acting like the grad students have clean hands here which is clearly not true. They joined the union with the intent they would negotiate on their behalf. The union did so and promised to stop any wildcat strike. The students didn't like the job the union did, so they went on strike, violating the contract.
- garmaine 7y agoOk, so how about next time I'm mad about something I throw a brick through your window? That should cause some disruption and make you pay attention. Dirsupting uninvolved people to get attention is self-serving and short-sighted. You do that to me and I will be against your cause for sure.
- antiterra 7y agoI sense you've never been a low-income undergrad who has experienced the crushing burden of repaying a student loan without having either the a degree or career prospects to show for it.
- asdff 7y agoIt's not like people were forced to not recieve grades. The school is free to hire graders who aren't graduate students, and the professors are free to grade their own exams. If undergrads are upset, they should be directing their anger to the administration for failing to pay for labor rather than expecting someone to do full time work on a 20k salary while their yearly rental payments total north of 24k.
- csb6 7y agoIf you read the rest of the article, you would see that the union is alleging that the UC administration was not willing to engage in negotiations to raise compensation for grad students, who were unable to afford their rent payments. It's no wonder a wildcat strike happened. Also, I am saddened by your comment about withholding grades being an unnecessary "burden". That's the point of a strike. What do you think a strike is? They are withholding, not erasing grades, and the goal of the strikers is to force the university to pay attention. The true "unnecessary burden" is UC Santa Cruz not paying grad students enough to pay their rents. If the university had done so, then the grad students would not have had to try to get the administration's attention.
- oh_sigh 7y agoWhy was it just these 54 grad students that could t afford rent? How many grad students does the system have?
- csb6 7y agoIndeed, 100% of the people affected by injustice will always go on strike. No external factors exist. The likely reason only 54 went on strike is because most grad students were afraid for their jobs, which the university has shown to be well-founded.