8/11/26 Bargaining Session: University Refuses Union Proposals

The University and the Union had another bargaining session on Monday August 10th. The Union made meaningful movement towards the University's position with counters on 4 articles, while the University returned an article with an inferior provision to what was in our current contract.

Compensation

The BC brought a revised proposal which reasserted most of the positions taken in SWC’s initial position but dropped (1) our demand for quarterly raises in favor of annual raises and (2) our demand for universal 12-month appointments, both of which were discussed at our General Body Meeting last week. We also brought testimony from the E3B department to state that department’s strict need for 12-month appointments, which they have yet to respond to.

The Key Takeaway: Many members of our unit have expressed that they would like to see a compensation counter from Columbia before proposing a different base pay number. Today, after we presented our revised compensation proposal, Columbia stated it would be difficult – if not impossible – for the University to provide a written counter while our current base pay demand is not, in their view, a “serious” proposal. The Bargaining Committee believes that these statements amount to a rejection of our compensation proposal and should be treated as the University’s response on compensation at this stage in bargaining.

Immediately after our presentation of the revised proposal, the University strongly objected to language about guaranteed years of funding and our demand to have raises come from a central University fund instead of PI grants.

After both sides caucused, the University added to their objections by taking aim at our base pay proposal of $76,372 for 2025-2026. They said that our proposal, which would give us a living wage for 2026-2027 but represents a 62% increase over what 12-month appointees made in 2025-2026, was “not a serious proposal” and that it was “extremely difficult to respond”.

Child Care

We brought a revised child care proposal to the table which dropped our ask for the yearly subsidy to $15,000 and eliminated our demand for parents with unemployed partners to get double the subsidy. The University’s position was that it was not “appropriate” to pay “a higher salary for parents.” They disapproved of subsidies going to 17 and 18 year olds, saying they don’t have care costs. Our disagreement on this article is a question of scope: the University believes the Child Care article should only provide benefits for the costs of child care (e.g. daycare, babysitting) while the Union’s position is that it should be used as a subsidy which can help parents with the myriad costs associated with raising a child in NYC.

Benefits

We brought a revised benefits article which clarified our demand for a Disability Equity Fund and reduced the amount we are asking for in that fund to $350,000, from $375,000. We continue to ask for the University to allow student employees to choose the health care plan that works best for them between the Student Aetna plan and the Faculty and Staff UnitedHealthCare plan. The University focused their response on this demand, expressing their objection to having student workers able to pick the UnitedHealthCare plan at no monthly cost.

Union Activity/Access

The Union brought a heavily revised counter in an effort to get to a TA on this article during this session. We dropped our ask for a bulletin board and access to a room booking service for our meetings in favor of language more similar to what the postdocs have in their contract. Instead of moving towards our position, the University offered us “at most 10 minutes” for the yearly orientation presentation, an inferior provision to what was in the previous contract.