GRADUATE EMPLOYEE STRIKE AT THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT CHICAGO: WHAT HAPPENED AND WHAT'S LEFT
Photo: Ashlee Rezin/Sun-Times After a year of bargaining with the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) with the help of a federal monitor over unlivable wages, little sexual assault/bullying protections, and other issues, a very exhausted Graduate Employee Organization (GEO) finally made the arduous decision to pause their classes and go on strike. On April 17th, as students were making their way between classes, more than 100 members of the GEO held a rally on the Quad in the center of UIC campus. The contract for the GEO ended just over a year prior to the strike. Negotiations between the administration and the union, which has 1,500 members, started underway in April 2021, but they stalled once they got to economic problems. The union held a strike vote on April 1 and 97% of voting members voted in favor of the strike. After a year of bargaining with the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) with the help of a federal monitor over unlivable wages, little sexual assault/bull
