California college student workers should form unions not to socialize, but to organize their labor power.
Joining fellow workers to create a negotiating bloc is the most effective way to have one’s voice heard at work.
Organizing is just another wonderful expression of the student voice.
At the University of California, Berkeley, students have already won organizing victories with the formation of an undergraduate workers union.
After complaints about $60,000 in unpaid wages, workers at UCB’s Cal Dining services walked out. Twenty students were fired from their jobs until Cal Dining caved to protesters.
All workers were re-hired. Training was extended and the university committed to back pay for unpaid wages and mandated breaks. These little victories amount to an important change in student employee relations at colleges.
Because student work is supposed to be temporary and accommodating to class schedules, student employers argue the work is less valuable and not conducive to unions.
However, traditional union have organized around temporary jobs. Construction unions, which are among the largest in membership, only perform such jobs.
Rather than assuming an oppositional relationship between unions and employers, unions strengthen the voice of workers; leadership is chosen democratically and the impact of worker concerns are more potent.
Students increasingly rely on employment through federal and state work study programs to meet basic living standards.
Colleges tend to raise the cost of living in their communities because of their attraction to homeowners and high wage earners.
Student wages at colleges across California fall below the minimum of the counties and municipalities
they are in.
Colleges use their legal status as a state entity to avoid paying
county and municipal wage rates.
If they could pay less, they would.
Student employment offices say that because they offer the flexibility to adapt to student schedules, low pay is part of the package.
But student employment schedules are unreliable themselves. For example, students at the Learning Center find out about their schedules one week or sometimes days in advance of when they are needed.
Manipulations about the favors colleges offer to students by using their labor and adjusting to wacky schedules is one of many used to stifle the negotiating power all workers, even the young ones collectively possess.
Underpaid employment deprives the communities around colleges from minimum wage-paying jobs and drives down labor value.
When Los Angeles County Supervisors approved the $15 an hour wage hike in July 2015, they did so under
the pressure of organized labor.
The measure was met with innumerable myths about driving employers out of business and crashing the economy.
But, more disposable income for the working class circulates in the economy.
Many students whose first job is with the college may be unfamiliar with the employment dynamics. They would benefit from feeling they have a voice in the negotiating process with the protection of collective bargaining.
Student workers at Citrus College recently received a 50 cent increase, turning the hourly wage up to $11 per hour because state law mandated it.
Never mind that steps away from the college, Los Angeles County minimum wage paying jobs currently offer at least $12 per hour. Larger businesses must pay $13.25 per hour.
Citrus will raise wages as state law mandates, but students should not rely on the goodwill of Sacramento.
Many chain restaurants like Panera and Pizza Hut offer hours
of employment outside of regular business to Citrus College students while paying the wage of the county, which is one of the most expensive places to live in the nation.
So, why should college students accept less? A labor hour at an
“unskilled” job is worth as much as any other in one of the county.
Young adults should be afforded the subtle dignity of knowing their effort is worth at least as much as a minimum wage.
Campus jobs are not easy. Students working at the campus Starbucks report having repeatedly burnt their arms with fresh cups of coffee. Student ushers trudging up and down the broad 1970s stairs of the Haugh Performing Art Center stand for hours without being allowed to sit. It hurts the knees just thinking about it.
They must also dress up in suits they can’t afford to get laundered.
Then there are the student managers who think worker camaraderie is cracking the odd sexist, sexual or homophobic joke.
I had to remind a young manager in the Haugh last April that it was Sexual Harassment Awareness Month when he made an awkward remark to a woman coworker.
Harvard Business Review reports that one of the main reasons sexual harassmentis pervasive in the food service industry is because young women often work under the management of young somewhat inexperienced men.
Service unions like the Service Employees International Union have made sexual harassment a strike-causing issue years in advance of the #METOO movement. The union faced internal opposition in doing so, but to the enlightenment of its members passed rules not tolerating sexual harassment by employers.
Service and construction unions work at job sites with less permanence than college student workers.
They have accomplished their market power through worker training and strong allegiance to their collective
membership. College students have no reason not to do the same.
Marissa Reyes has worked at the campus Starbucks for a year and a half and enjoys her work.
“Most baristas get paid more than minimum wage, but the school can’t pay more than that, so it’s just the convenience of working here that they pay us that,” she said.
While Reyes says she does enjoy a 20 percent discount on her iced coffees as a “perk,” an increase in wage or safety standards might be much more valuable.
“Sometimes if we overfill the pots it spills a little and burns, but it’s part of the job, I guess,” Reyes said.
Student workers like Reyes should not have to compromise on this aspect of campus safety, let alone at a lower wage than her Starbucks counterparts off-campus.
Student and faculty labor controversies are getting attention in national news from grad students at New York’s Columbia University organizing for higher pay to UC Berkeley’s student employee union challenging sexual harassment.
Perhaps students can recycle a few of the chants of American organized labor’s bygone he yday or create a few of their own. Get wise, organize.
