Our Academic Community

A quick glance around Yale will tell you that our University is no longer the small, insular academic community it was in 1701. We’re a prestigious educator, a global university, a wealthy corporation, a health-care provider, and a generator of public policy. We’re also a model for universities everywhere, so the example we set on our campus and in our city radiates throughout the entire Academy. This section looks at our stake in this fight as undergraduates, and the impact it has on our academic and social lives.

Casualization
At Yale, the same corporate trends are at work in the educational sphere as in employment and health-care. The University extracts maximum profits by relying on low-paid casual workers for the bulk of research and teaching. Our education tends to suffer when our TAs are worrying about health-coverage, child-care, or the ever-shrinking job opportunities in higher-education. In 2000 the Coalition of Graduate Employee Unions (CGEU) published Casual Nation, an assessment of casualization in the Academy. GESO published a similar report dealing specifically with Yale, called Casual in Blue.

Over the summer of 2003, a graduate student committee again surveyed casualization at Yale and released a series of reports on how casualized labor affects undergrad education and the future of higher education. Blackboard Blues focuses specifically on the changing face of teaching at Yale and its impact on our classrooms.

Blackboard Blues Summary

Students have organized a series of forums on casualization and undergraduate education in cities around the country. Click here for a forum in your area.

Other GESO reports from this summer and earlier.

Free Speech
This labor conflict brought out both the best and the worst in our Community. The last few years have seen an unprecedented, frank discussion of real-world socioeconomic issues in our classrooms, dining halls, etc. But we’ve also witnessed extremely discouraging attempts to suppress ideas and opinions – not to mention collective action. In early September, 8 Yale workers were arrested at Yale-New Haven Hospital for distributing leaflets. 2 UOC members were also detained and threatened with arrest. Neither of these actions was condemned by the Yale administration.

In response, 76 undergraduates filed a formal complaint against President Levin for free-speech violations. The UOC is committed to preserving free expression on campus, as a vital component of democratic community at Yale. Click here for the full text of the complaint, and here to read news coverage.

During the strike, free speech again came to the fore when students and graduate teachers were threatened with arrest and escorted from buildings for wearing signs supporting workers. Their names and home addresses were taken by police officers, and they were told that the University administrators had banned union signs and t-shirts from Yale buildings. During the 2003 Parents' Weekend events in October, the University instructed ushers that "students are not allowed to distribute propaganda to parents on Beinecke Plaza" -- despite clear protection under the Yale free speech policy. (We did it anyway).

Diversity
The UOC is an adjunct member of the Pan-Ethnic Coalition, and stands solidly behind the fight for minority access, tenure diversity, and curricular reform at Yale. These are shared struggles, stemming from a basic denial of democracy and justice to members of the Yale community. For more information, visit La Casa, the Afam House, or the Asian-American Cultural Center. Also, click here to read the UOC’s letter to President Levin on behalf of the Pan-Ethnic Coalition.

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