[PEN-L:2375] Yale update (fwd)

[John William Hull <jwhull@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Tue, 16 Jan 1996 12:38:04 -0800 (PST)
From: Debra Lynn Klein <debbie@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: ase-list@xxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Yale update


Hi all.  Here's a very detailed-- alarming, yet encouraging-- report from
Gordon Lafer, Director of Research at Yale:

This is an update following the Wed Jan 10 demonstration:

Dear Friends:

 Here's the latest on the Yale strike:

 This past Wednesday, 138 people were arrested for blocking the street in
front of the Yale Graduate School in protest over the disciplinary hearings
going on against three leaders of the union here.  There was a total of over
500 people at the demonstration, including workers from the other Yale unions
and faculty and graduate students from other universities throughout the New
York/New England region.

 The "trials" took much longer than anyone expected.  The first five hours
were taken up with negotiations over whether or not our lawyer -- a Yale law
professor -- would be allowed to address the Disciplinary Committee on
procedural issues, and ended with the Committee ruling that he could not.  So
we had a lawyer present who was not allowed to say a word throughout the
proceedings.  The Committee would not allow a union steward to participate in
the hearings, and refused a request to tape record the proceedings.  When the
person being charged asked to question the Dean of the Graduate School, she
was required to write out a short list of questions, which the Committee read
privately to the Dean, and then summarized his answers, with no chance for
cross-examination.  After a day and a half of hearings, the Committee found
Diana Paton guilty of "disrupting University business" and "refusal to obey
an order issued in the line of duty by a faculty member."  She has had a
letter of reprimand placed in her file, and is barred from teaching for the
spring semester, i.e. she was fired from her spring semester job.  The second
case is scheduled to be heard on Monday, and the third either late this
coming week or the beginning of the following week.

 While we're obviously relieved that Ms. Paton was not expelled, to be banned
from teaching is illegal under federal labor law.  On Thursday we filed
federal charges against the Yale adminsitration for violating the National
Labor Relations Act, though since the courts have not yet ruled whether
graduate teachers are covered under the Act, it may take years before this
case is settled.

 Meanwhile, Yale is going ahead with plans to lock out all strike
participants.  Last week, all teaching assistants got letters at home
threatening that if they did not turn in grades by the start of the spring
semester on Monday, January 15, they will be fired.  Yale is on the way to
becoming the first university to use academic "replacement workers" --
several departments are recruiting anti-union faculty and graduate students
to take the jobs of fired TA's.  Faculty members who are known "liberals" in
their scholarly work are now cancelling lectures, eliminating discussion
sections, or capping undergraduate enrollment in order to comply with the
administration's lockout strategy.  It's not clear whether Yale can really
get by with so many TA's locked out, how much undergraduate education will be
compromised, and how the incredible bitterness and tension in the Graduate
School will play out.

 On Sunday, Jan. 21, the contracts for Yale's other two unions expire.  These
unions, representing clerical workers, technicians, dining hall, custodial
and maintenance workers, are facing their own problems, with Yale asking for
major cuts in wages and benefits.  GESO is officially allied with the other
Yale unions, and there is a real possibility of a campus-wide strike during
part of the coming semester.

 There have been some TA's who have been intimidated by Yale's tactics and
have handed in their grades.  For the most part, however, the strike
participants are holding strong, and we're hopeful that the administration
will begin talks soon.  Last week's lockout deadline for those TA's who teach
their own courses came and went without a single person handing over their
grades.  The pressure from outside academics remains critical -- your letters
to President Levin (richard.levin@xxxxxxxx), Yale faculty
(firstname.lastname@xxxxxxxx) and the campus paper
(ydn@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx), together with the censure motions at the academic
conventions, are creating increasing pressure on the administration to
negotiate.  The administration's style in the past is always to say "no, no,
never" right up util the last minute, so we take their current intransigence
with a large grain of salt. Between the strikers on campus and supporters in
the broader community, we're confident that we can bring Yale to the
negotiating table.

 With some people already locked out of jobs, and anticipating the
possibility of a broader strike, we have begun a hardship fund to help pay
the rent, utilities, etc. of people who are without jobs.  If you are
interested in contributing, checks can be made out to GESO, with a notation
of "hardship fund", and sent to 425 College St., New Haven, CT, 06511.  In
the event of a campus-wide strike, the hardship fund will be made available
to members of the other Yale unions in addition to the TAs.

 Again -- thanks incredibly for your support.

 Gordon Lafer, Research Director, Federation of University Employees at Yale