Recently, groups of student resident workers at academic institutions are consolidating in reaction to what they claim is inadequate compensation for their rigorous jobs where they are expected to do a lot more than keep resident spaces in order. With these extra responsibilities including, but not confined to, supporting students with mental/medical issues, and who have experienced sexual assault. This is all in addition to the weeks of unpaid training RAs must undergo before beginning their duties.
“It’s really not that hard to see that, up until this point, universities have had all of the leverage,” Sam Betsko, an RA at Boston University, which voted this past week to officiate a union, told the Times, “We see that students have been exploited by this.” Boston University is one of three colleges this week where students voted to unionize, the others being Swarthmore College and Smith College.
In 2021, Betsko decided that the RAs needed a union, and this past March, they had an overwhelming vote that ruled in favor of creating one. The contract negotiations began this past Friday, during a week when student residence workers at Swarthmore College and Smith college also voted to unionize.
This emergence of campus labor movements has led students and families to question if college is still worth its hefty prices, and programs like the one for RAs are seemingly becoming less able to support students who are working for it.
However, many university leaders and administrators argue that they already provide generous benefits to student workers like covering the cost of housing that usually racks up to more than $10,000 a year.
Yet, the trend of labor unions forming in numerous institutions demonstrates a pattern that opposes this assertion.
With the help of groups such as the Service Employees International Union and the Office and Professional Employees International Union, students have garnered support for elections, contract talks, and attention-grabbing protests.
Various other universities like Boston University and the University of Pennsylvania have issued statements claiming that these unions are unnecessary, as they argue the compensation is fair to the position, whereas other colleges like Tufts University gave no comment at all.
However, these coalitions of resident workers push on in their objective to obtain more benefits for their strenuous responsibilities, as they hope to improve this conflict not only for themselves but also future RAs.
