After 28 days on the picket lines (beginning March 24), staff at Vermont's tiny Goddard College are returning to work having tentatively won their strike. The Goddard College Staff Union, affiliated with the United Auto Workers (UAW), covers about 30 non-faculty employees and had been in talks with the university for about a year before going on strike.
Points of dispute are easy to find on both sides of negotiations in this case thanks to the coverage of VTDigger. The university's president apparently insisted the union agree to a management rights clause–apparently on the grounds that this is fairly standard–and the union rejected this. Conversely, the university was unwilling to immediately agree to a cost-of-living adjustment without the union surrendering rights to negotiate in other areas.
Ultimately: the union got basically everything it wanted that's been publicly reported. The management rights clause was rejected and most staff will now be making close to or over $20/hr. According to the union, the tentative agreement includes "a 3 percent raise for every staff member making more than $20 an hour, and a 5.75 percent raise for those making less". You can read their statement on the win here.
