Sending the graduate employee union’s negotiating letter to the University of Montana’s administration on April 2 was years in the making, post-doctorate student Colette Berg said. Now the wait for official recognition begins.

Berg, 29, studies ecology and evolution while serving as an organizer of the graduate student union. The union’s hope, along with voluntary recognition from UM, is to negotiate for higher wages and benefits like discounted tuition fees for graduate students working as teaching assistants or in other research roles. For many students, these increases would lift some of the burden of affording housing, food and healthcare. 

The union formed in 2022, but organization began in 2021. Unionizing properly and legally took time. It hosted events and informational sessions to raise awareness. It collected signatures on petitions as proof of support from graduate students. Once it had 300 signatures, it recruited stewards, or representatives, from departments across campus and began passing out union cards. 

Those cards, which certify membership, got the majority interest of grad students in order to file for official recognition with the National Labor Relations Board. Now, the union has submitted its letter to University administration and the wait for negotiations begins. 

UM Spokesperson Dave Kuntz said while the University hasn’t responded to the letter, it has been working behind the scenes to prepare the correct paperwork and petitions when a group unionizes on campus. 

Official recognition will come from the Office of the Commissioner of the Higher Education and the Montana Department of Labor and Industry, not the University. Kuntz said it’s too premature to say if negotiations will happen. 

“I don’t think it’s as black and white from that original letter as the grad students made it seem,” Kuntz said. “[The union] has to meet certain thresholds and work through the state.” Kuntz did not have specifics on the paperwork currently in the work. 

One of the letter’s biggest asks is increased stipends. Currently, teaching assistantship salaries start at $10,000 for a master’s degree and $16,000 for post-doctorates, according to graduate school dean Ashby Kinch. These stipends are often supplemented with grants and funding and vary per student. This means grad students are not paid equally across the different departments. 

The Kaimin called Kinch for comment on the Union’s letter but did not hear back in time for publication. 

A 2020 Kaimin article reported pay for teaching and research assistantships averaged roughly $10,300 less than the national average. Back then, master’s students made $9,000 and postdoctoral students made $14,800. 

Along with raising wages, union members want to address the impact of tuition fees. These fees range from the Student Senate’s to campus recreation fees. While some fees are fixed, like the $30 registration fee, others depend on the student’s course load. A teaching or resident assistant taking only one credit might pay $815 total in fees, while a student taking 12 or more credits would pay around $5,294. The full list can be found on the University business services website. 

Berg estimated paying roughly $1,300 per semester in fees. “Coming in from the summer, living on a narrower budget already, and then needing to just cover $1,300 has been a horrible time, every time,” she said. 

Studying, researching and teaching can be a difficult tightrope to walk. Ezra Mendales, a 30-year-old graduate student and union member, studies high-elevation mammals as part of his ecology and evolution doctorate along with teaching classes. 

“Teaching takes up a ton of time,” he said. “You’re supposed to be working eight hours a week…you could be teaching two four-hour classes and then you have no extra time allotted in that to be grading or preparing for lectures.”

Berg, who teaches at the Rocky Mountain Flora Lab and a botany lab at UM, said safety is another concern. “There’s very little you can do if something goes wrong,” she said. “There’s not a lot of protections for TAs and RAs that are specific to TAs and RAs.” 

Neither Berg nor Mendales mentioned specific situations in which graduate employees experienced safety issues. 

Kuntz said unions are often comprised of members from multiple campuses across the state, so negotiations happen through OCHE rather than one particular campus. Deputy Commissioner for Government Relations and Communications with the Montana University System Galen Hollenbaugh said, “OCHE looks forward to working with the graduate students when they finalize their organizational efforts.”

Berg said everyone who has signed union cards is a graduate employee at UM. A democratic election process will select union representatives to go to negotiations, according to Berg. They’ll be assisted by Tammy Harris from the Montana Federation of Public Employees. MFPE represents workers employed through government agencies. At the time of the interview, the union had not heard from the University about negotiations. Berg declined to comment on whether the University had responded to the letter. 

Other students, like Bethany Miller, a 27-year-old studying pharmaceutical science and drug design, said they’re often working as teaching assistants for all four to five years of the program, unlike others that only require one year of teaching. Despite the time requirement, Berg and Mendales said they still enjoyed teaching. “I get a lot out of it…with the amount of work that goes into it, sometimes it’s hard to balance all these things,” Mendales said.

According to Berg, the union on campus takes inspiration from the graduate student union at Montana State University. “The fact that they unionized in [2011] was super inspiring to us,” she said. 

After several appeals by MSU to the Montana Labor Board, and a 20 month legal battle, the University officially recognized the Graduate Employee Organization in 2011, and it won its right to bargain. UM union leaders keep in contact with the president of MSU’s union for advice. 

That advice includes writing its constitution. Berg said the union is modeling its constitution off of MSU’s version. It plans to elect a president, vice president and treasurer. Until then, and until it’s recognized, there is no official union leadership. 

Berg and other members decided to unionize instead of working with the ASUM-recognized Graduate Student Association. They preferred acting as a collective bargaining group. “We think we are way more powerful if we stand together as workers,” Berg said. “That said, we’re super excited…and on the same side of literally any group that’s trying to improve lives for grad students.” 

Berg joined in the organization efforts in 2021. Many of the students she worked with to raise unionization efforts have since graduated, and she hopes to graduate herself next semester. “I’m really excited to pass it on,” Berg said.