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‘Union monopoly’ is hurting student workers’ academic freedom, attorney says
A Cornell University PhD student is asking the National Labor Relations Board to end a 2016 “one-size-fits-all” decision that gives union leaders power over graduate workers, an attorney for the student told The College Fix.
The student, Russell Burgett, who is studying chemistry and chemical biology, filed the appeal with the federal board in February. He also filed charges against Cornell’s Graduate Student Union last year to contest its exclusive bargaining authority over the representation of the school’s graduate students.
The National Right to Work Foundation, a nonprofit organization that strives to “eliminate coercive union power and compulsory unionism abuses,” is representing Burgett in both matters.
“It’s long past time the NLRB reaffirm that graduate students were never intended to be swept under federal labor law’s union boss-friendly provisions, and Mr. Burgett’s case is an ideal vehicle for the agency to do so,” its Vice President Patrick Semmens told The Fix in a recent email.
Semmens said the appeal asks the National Labor Relations Board to reconsider its 2016 Columbia University decision. He described it as “a one-size-fits-all bargaining model that gives union officials the power to impose their ‘representation’ on people like Mr. Burgett who don’t want and never asked for a union.”
In the appeal, Burgett and his lawyers argue that the labor board should treat graduate students as having a “business and academic” relationship with their universities, and not as “employees” of their schools.
Additionally, the appeal asks the labor board’s General Counsel to prosecute Cornell union officials for allegedly “blocking the university from doing business with students who abstain from union membership or union financial support” through their union agreements.
Those union agreements “require an entity to cease doing business with those who refuse union association” and “blatantly violate the NLRA,” Burgett alleges in the appeal.
Burgett is not a member of the union because he opposes its “radical ideology,” according to a foundation news release.
Despite his beliefs, he can be forced to pay union dues because of New York state law in conjunction with the National Labor Relations Board’s decision to label students as “employees.”
However, “the text of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) does not include students in its definition of employees,” Semmens told The Fix previously.
If graduate students are not classified as employees, the graduate student union’s contract, which prohibits the university from engaging with students who opt out of union affiliation, is an unlawful “secondary agreement” explicitly prohibited under the NLRA, Semmens said.
Burgett did ask the union to opt-out of paying part of the dues that fund its political activities, but leaders refused to accommodate him, according to the news release.
Speaking with The Fix more recently, Semmens said the situation also is “harmful” to academic freedom.
“While union monopoly bargaining poses that kind of threat in any sector, it’s especially harmful to academic freedom on college campuses, because union officials can effectively stop the research and teaching work of graduate students who dissent from and refuse to support the union’s agenda,” he said.
Cornell’s media relations office did not respond to The Fix’s requests for comment via email over the past two weeks, asking about the appeal.
Previously, when Burgett filed his initial charges, a university spokesperson told The Fix that Cornell is “aware of the charges against the Cornell Graduate Student Union, as well as the University, and intend to defend ourselves before the National Labor Relations Board.”
MORE: Cornell student challenges union control over graduate workers in federal labor case
