BUGWU, the Boston University Graduate Workers Union, announced yesterday that its campaign to overturn Boston University's freezing of PhD stipends has succeeded. After filing an unfair labor practice and launching a letter writing campaign to campus leadership, the university has relented on the policy. 2023-24 PhD students will effectively receive a several percentage stipend increase as a result (against the wishes of the University).
The tension here comes as BUGWU and Boston University are to negotiate their first contract this semester. This iteration of BUGWU formed last year, and its 3,000 grad won their union election by an astonishing vote of 1,414 to 21—hard to argue against from any university. Unfortunately, that hasn't stopped Boston University from what it attempted to do here, which was change the status quo without warning or justification.
The justification for the freeze on Boston University's end was that they had already done an "unusual" 4% increase to the PhD stipend last year and so no adjustment was needed this year. But worth noting is that the PhD stipend is not a living wage (and it's not competitive with other universities in the area either) and so freezing it has disastrous consequences on an already financially insecure student body. The full, frozen stipend from Boston University was $38,253, and an eight-month stipend was $25,502; yet a living wage in the Boston area is about $47,000. MIT students by comparison have a stipend north of $45,000, and Northwestern students have been demanding one of $50,000 at their university. Boston University nonetheless refused to budge on this matter until today when the unfair labor practice and campaign forced their hand.
Incidentally, I do not think relations between BUGWU and the university are going to get better this semester: CEO of Warner Bros. Discovery David Zaslav is supposed to be the school's commencement speaker, and BUGWU and BU YDSA are moving to have his speech cancelled and replaced with someone else.