POST-ELECTION FAQ

We won our election and now we get to bargain for a strong contract! Together, we can win concrete benefits and protections that will improve the grad experience at Cornell for years to come. Here, you will find crucial information about our bargaining committee.

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What happens after the votes are counted and CGSU-UE is certified as our collective bargaining representative?

The next step in our campaign is bargaining. This is the process by which we will negotiate with Cornell to secure protections in the form of a contract. The protections we seek will be based on the broad planks of our platform -- a living wage, always; expanded benefits; equitable policies; international student support -- but the exact nature of what this means in a contract is to be determined over the course of the bargaining process. See below for a timeline/description of how we will collectively develop specific contract proposals.

What is a contract?

A union contract is a written agreement between the employer and the employees, that is voted upon and ratified by all CGSU-UE members, that details the terms and benefits of employment in a clear and legally-binding way. Having a contract ensures that all graduate workers at Cornell University, whether members of the union or not, can clearly understand their rights and obligations as employees of the university. A contract also ensures that all graduate workers have recourse to standardized grievance procedures when the agreed-upon terms and benefits of the contract are violated.

Union contracts are set for specific periods of time (the average in the US being 3-4 years), after which the terms of the contract can be renegotiated and voted upon by the membership.

What does the bargaining process look like?

The bargaining process will broadly follow these steps:

1. Bargaining Committee elections: All members of the union will be eligible to vote for nominated Bargaining Committee members to represent them by division/area. The process by which the election will be conducted and the make-up of representatives in the Bargaining Committee (total number and apportionment by division/area) will be based on the model provided by other UE grad unions at MIT, Northwestern, the University of Chicago, and others. These UE-affiliated grad unions have had great success with this model, and CGSU will adapt it to avoid reinventing the wheel and unnecessarily delaying the negotiation of our first contract. 

2. Bargaining survey: We will distribute a survey among all graduate workers, asking workers the issues they most care about. Organizers will also carry out walkthroughs and hold department town halls/one-on-ones to solicit feedback on this survey and answer questions about the bargaining process. Based on the survey results, the Bargaining Committee will determine our collective priorities for bargaining.

3. Proposal drafting: The Bargaining Committee will write up an initial draft of the proposal, based on 1) the results from the bargaining survey, 2) contract content from other institutions, and 3) standard legal language from labor relations.

4. Proposal feedback: After finishing the initial draft of contract proposals, the Bargaining Committee will ask membership for feedback on the Bargaining Platform, and will undertake revisions as necessary. Then, the Bargaining Platform will be ratified by all the members. 

5. Negotiation with Cornell University administration: The Bargaining Committee will present the proposals to Cornell’s administration. The administration will respond point by point on whether a specific proposal is accepted, rejected, or amended. The administration will also put forth their own proposals. Our Bargaining Committee will consider Cornell administration’s response, and discuss each item during a caucus to make our own set of acceptances, rejections, amendments. These steps will go back and forth until our Bargaining Committee reaches a tentative agreement with Cornell admin. After each session, our Contract Action Team (formerly known as our Organizing Committee) provides updates to the membership about the bargaining process.
All graduate student-workers are strongly encouraged to be engaged throughout the negotiation process. For example, graduate student-workers can continue to participate and take action around the issues that we care about by sharing testimonials or joining the Contract Action Team.

6. Ratification: The tentative agreement agreed to by both the Bargaining Committee and the Cornell administration will be put to a vote among the union membership. The proposal will be put into effect once a majority of the members vote yes on the contract. If the tentative agreement is voted down, we will collectively decide how to put enough pressure on Cornell admin to get them to improve the offer.

What's the Bargaining Committee?

The bargaining committee is a set of representatives elected from CGSU’s membership. This committee is responsible for developing a first contract that directly addresses the needs of the Cornell grads that comprise our union. The bargaining committee will have both bargaining and organizing responsibilities in order to ensure that strong proposals are drafted and are supplemented by membership action when our collective strength is needed to secure wins!

The bargaining committee’s 24 members will be drawn from five college-defined regions. Representation will be distributed by region to ensure that the diversity of grad experiences across the university are represented at the bargaining table. Each seat represents approximately 150 graduate workers in that region. CGSU members will vote for candidates to represent their region.

Who’s eligible to be on the Bargaining Committee? 

Any graduate student pursuing a degree at Cornell who meets the five eligibility criteria noted below can run.

• You must have signed a CGSU-UE union card

• You must receive, or have received in 2023, a stipend from Cornell University to provide teaching or research services, under one of the following titles: teaching assistant, research assistant, graduate assistant, graduate research assistant, or fellow

• You must be able to commit to serve for 1 full calendar year and must not have active plans to graduate before December 2024

• You must not hold an active position in the Graduate and Professional Student Assembly while serving on the Bargaining Committee, as explained in the FAQ

• You must be able to fulfill the responsibilities of the Bargaining Committee, as explained in the FAQ

Who will be voting on members of the Bargaining Committee?

All CGSU-UE members are eligible to vote in this election. If you signed a CGSU-UE union authorization card in fall 2023, you are a CGSU-UE member and will be eligible to vote in the Bargaining Committee election. If you can’t remember if you signed a card, you can email cgsu.ue.elections@gmail.com to ask. If you would like to sign a card, you still can here!

How will the Bargaining Committee election work?

The election will be conducted electronically. You’ll receive an email next week with more details from the Elections Committee.

What is the Contract Action Team (CAT)?

The CAT is a group of graduate workers who organize the union's power on campus so that the BC can have the leverage needed to succeed in negotiations. The CAT also keeps the general membership informed throughout the bargaining process. If Cornell admin can sense that the union is no larger than the 25 graduate workers at the bargaining table, they will concede nothing;  admin must instead see the union in 1000s of graduate workers across campus, organized and mobilized by CAT to respond to the state of negotiations and support their BC.

Who can serve on the CAT?

Anyone who wants us to win a strong contract and will to organize the union! A strong CAT has 100s of members who together can activate 1000s of graduate workers. Our own CAT at Cornell will be an expansion of our existing Organizing Committee (OC) intended to meet the organizing needs of the contract fight, and will no longer be just a place for Department Organizers (DOs). Rather, DOs and non-DOs alike are encouraged to be involved in the CAT at a range of different commitment levels.

How can I get involved in the CAT?

You can sign up to join the CAT by filling out this form or by contacting one of your Department Organizers!

What will CAT members be expected to do?

As always, the basic work of organizing leverage requires a willingness to have conversations with labmates, coworkers and friends to build majority support and participation in actions including: flyering, doing walkthroughs, running petitions, turning folks out to rallies and meetings, etc. After each bargaining session, the CAT consults with BC, updates the membership on what has occurred, and employs the strategic tools in their toolbox to help move the balance of power on campus in the BC's favor.

The bargaining survey is another immediate job which resembles an internal power analysis of our union, also to inform strategy: what are our deepest, widest felt issues to be addressed in a contract? how much risk will we take to secure one contract provision vs. another? in which departments do a majority of graduate workers respond or fail to respond when our CAT distributes it?

CAT members can join various teams as well:

• Comms - helps create graphics, newsletters, op-eds, edit the website etc. to keep info up to date

• Research - helps us keep a finger on the issues affecting us as grad workers to develop proposals and actions to address them in our contract fight

• Budget - assisting with fiscal planning

• Solidarity - building coalition with sister UE unions (NUGW, TRU-Johns Hopkins, MITGSU, Princeton GSU, NMSU, UNM), UChicago unions (NNU, SEIU, Teamsters), campus and community orgs, and more

• Member education/trainings

• Direct action and event planning

Have more questions? See for upcoming virtual Bargaining Committee Info Office Hours where you drop by and get your questions answered by staff and union leaders.