Why a Union for RAs Makes No Sense

The Chronicle of Higher Education
April 26, 2002

Undergraduate students who serve as resident assistants at the University of Massachusetts Amherst recently voted to become the first union of student resident assistants in the country. When colleagues ask why I am opposed to this move, my first thought is that it simply defies common sense. But as Chancellor of a major research university, I know I am expected to explain my views more fully. In fact, I find this unionization effort deeply troubling for several reasons.

UMass Amherst is a heavily unionized campus. Our faculty members and librarians are represented by a union, as are our police officers and the overwhelming majority of our staff. Generally speaking, unions have been a positive force on campus, and the relationship between them and the administration has been productive. We have collaborated to enhance the work experience of our employees, to expand our fiscal resources, and to improve the physical condition of the campus. Our relationship has been characterized, more often than not, by mutual respect, collegiality, and cooperation.

Our relationship with the United Auto Workers--the union that represents our graduate student assistants and that has filed the current petition to represent the RAs--has been a notable and unfortunate exception. Our interactions have been fraught with significant difficulties that we have not experienced with other unions. Those difficulties have included contentious negotiations; the union's insistence on bargaining over nonemployment and social issues (including, for example, regulations governing graduate student behavior in the residence halls) that are not proper subjects for bargaining; and a disproportionate number of grievances, particularly about issues clearly not encompassed within the collective bargaining agreement.

Because of the transient nature of the student workforce, we have also experienced constant change in the union leadership, with each new cohort pressing issues of particular concern to its inner circle. The result is that a relatively small number of graduate students drive the union's agenda, while the vast majority--who are required to pay an agency fee for the privilege of representation by the UAW--appear entirely uninvolved. The administrative effects of the situation are quite tangible: We devote overwhelmingly more administrative time, much of it responding to confrontation, to dealing with this union than with any of our other bargaining units.

Our relationship with the graduate student union is a paradigm for what is likely to occur if we were to negotiate with our undergraduates. Not only is the union the same, but negotiating with students at any level is fraught with what I call ``status dissonance''--the inherently illogical fit between student status and collective bargaining. That dissonance is manifested in one of the most serious challenges we have experienced with our union of graduate student assistants: separating academic from employment issues.

We granted voluntary recognition to the graduate student union in 1990, after reaching an agreement that the subjects of negotiation would include only the terms and conditions of employment and that academic issues would be explicitly excluded. That distinction has proven extraordinarily difficult to maintain. A couple of years ago, for example, a graduate student who had been terminated from her academic program because of unsatisfactory progress toward the degree was, quite naturally, not awarded an assistantship for the following year, when she was no longer going to be a student. The union grieved and pursued the case all the way to arbitration before agreeing to a settlement. That particular clash between programmatic requirements and perceived rights is no isolated incident.

Such problems would be exacerbated if we were to enter into a collective bargaining relationship with a union of RAs. I fear that their unionization would inevitably lead to demands that we bargain over matters that are entirely inappropriate subjects for union negotiations, such as financial aid, academic status, student conduct and discipline, and dormitory conditions and regulations. This is not baseless speculation on my part. When the RAs first approached us about unionization, we asked what had led them to make this proposal. In their response, they cited such issues as the calculation of financial aid and the penalties for violations of the student code of conduct.

Even more than that of graduate assistants, the employment status of RAs is so inextricably intertwined with their academic status as to make collective bargaining an impossibility. The RAs at our institution are mostly undergraduate students who attend the university to pursue an education. They are selected as resident assistants based on their academic success, student leadership abilities, and potential as role models for other students. They retain those positions through continued adherence to academic and behavioral standards. I believe that the Massachusetts public employee collective bargaining statute was never intended to include such individuals within its purview and that to do so now would severely impair the university's ability to function as an educational institution.

Our residential life program, the fifth largest in the country, provides significant educational benefits to students, including those who serve as RAs. Through our residential program, we offer an expansive array of living-learning communities and do extensive work in educating students about social justice and diversity. Our residential academic and special interest programs are outstanding, and there is ample research to demonstrate that they have very positive effects on students, including better academic performance and higher retention rates.

Operating the program is an enormous challenge. We meet that challenge successfully because of the collaborative efforts of everyone involved in the residence halls: resident directors and assistant directors, management staff, community development assistants, and the resident assistants. I am proud of the residence life program on this campus, and I am proud of all the people who serve and have served in it. I believe that our best hope of preserving all that is good about this program is to continue to work collaboratively for the benefit of our students, using such mechanisms as the existing Resident Assistant Council, which was designed to afford an opportunity for RAs to provide input on issues related to the RA position and residential living.

The 360 students who serve as resident assistants are the ones who work most closely with students in the residence halls. They are crucial to their fellow students, from the moment they welcome them to campus as new students and help them feel less isolated, through their service to them as advisor, counselor, and peer support. What RAs do is hard work and requires a complex array of skills and talents. They must have outstanding listening and communication skills; they must possess excellent judgment and decision-making ability in difficult situations; they must be compassionate and understanding of a wide variety of people and situations. Dealing with negative student behavior is not pleasant; dealing with students who are in trouble, who are struggling academically, emotionally, or socially, is heart-wrenching.

These students make an enormous contribution to the University. But they do so most especially by serving as leaders among their peers, advisors to their peers, and role models for other students. The resident assistant program itself is also an educational experience that gives RAs the opportunity to develop their talents and leadership skills in ways that serve them well throughout their lives. It is a dangerous mistake to accede to the UAW's attempt to characterize this experience as nothing more than employment. And surely the experience should not be subject to the vagaries of an election among 360 students, 34 percent of whom did not vote, 24 percent of whom voted against the union, and approximately 50 percent of whom will graduate this spring, long before this dispute will be over.

The University of Massachusetts plans to seek judicial review of the finding of the Massachusetts Labor Relations Commission that undergraduate students appointed by the university as resident assistants in the residence halls are eligible to unionize. We will appeal the commission's decision in accordance with procedures established under Massachusetts law.

Prior decisions of the Massachusetts Labor Relations Commission and Massachusetts courts suggest that the only route by which the university can challenge the establishment of a bargaining unit is by refusing to bargain. The courts have been unwilling to hear appeals of election determinations or certifications following an election. Only by refusing to bargain, and then raising before the Massachusetts Labor Relations Commission and the Massachusetts courts the question of whether a bargaining unit of

undergraduate students is appropriate, can we challenge this misapplication of the state public employee collective bargaining statute.

We plan to do so because we believe that unionization of undergraduate students is incompatible with our responsibility to provide a high quality educational experience, irreconcilable with our responsibility for sound management of the campus, and extraordinarily bad public policy. And, yes, because it defies common sense.

Marcellette G. Williams is Chancellor of the University of Massachusetts Amherst