On Monday, graduate workers and researchers at UC Santa Barbara joined the picket line alongside workers at other University of California campuses as part of an ongoing strike over the treatment of students and workers protesting the war between Israel and Palestine. 

UAW 4811 represents 48,000 graduate students working as teacher assistants and graduate and post-doctoral researchers at all 11 campuses in the UC system. 

Workers at UC Santa Cruz began their strike on May 20, workers at UC Los Angeles and UC Davis were called to join last Tuesday, and workers at UC San Diego and UCSB joined on Monday. Workers at UC Irvine are set to begin their strike on Wednesday. 

On UCSB, campus workers began picketing at 9 a.m. Monday, and about 200 people attended a rally and a march in the afternoon.

They walked from the Paseo West entrance of the library and moved to North Hall, Student Affairs, the UCSB Liberated Zone and the engineering building, and then ended the march by walking through the library from the Paseo East entrance. 

Throughout the strike, workers called for a free Palestine, asked undergraduate students and faculty to support the strike, and called out the University of California for trying to stop the strike and interfere with their right to peacefully protest. 

Charmaine Chua, an assistant professor in the Global Studies Department, was the final speaker at the march, promising to respect the picket line and not submit grades, which is work usually done by teacher assistants. Finals week is June 8-14.

Chua called on the crowd to organize by emailing their professors that they support the strike and want their grades withheld from the university and to get departments to sign solidarity statements.

Madeline Vailhe, a graduate student worker and part of the union’s bargaining team, said 9,000 grades will be withheld because of the strike. 

Michael Miller, UCSB dean of undergraduate education, sent a campus-wide email stating that the university has “contingency plans” in place to ensure the “timely recording of final grades.”

Protests and Strikes at UCs

“As unionized academic workers, we have chosen with a supermajority vote to use our strongest weapon against what we understand to be the most egregious unfair labor practices,” Emma Hanlon said at the rally Monday afternoon.

Hanlon spoke out against the UC bringing in police to arrest students and workers protesting across the state. 

“Not only would the UC rather stick the state on its community members before demanding a safer workplace, the UC has decided that this is the only way it can address us,” Hanlon said. “Until the UC chooses a different way of communicating with its students and workers, we will stop working for them.”

On May 3, the union filed unfair labor practice charges against UCLA alleging that the university allowed violent attacks against protesters, forcibly arrested and deprived members of their liberty, and prohibited pro-Palestine speech at the worksite. The union later amended the unfair labor practice charges to include incidents at UC San Diego and UC Irvine. 

On May 17, the UC Office of the President filed unfair labor practice charges against the union, claiming the strike is illegal because of a no-strike provision in their agreement. 

On Monday, the state’s Public Employment Relations Board declined the UC’s claim that the strike is illegal. 

Vailhe, a graduate student worker who is also on the union’s bargaining team, said the strike is important to protect the rights of students and workers protesting and to prevent further police involvement and brutality on campus.

“If we don’t take a fight now, the university will feel emboldened to continue to silence free speech on our campus and make it so that the voices calling out their behavior aren’t heard,” Vailhe said at Monday’s rally and march.

Vailhe said the university has been sending emails saying that the strike is illegal and alleged that student visas could be revoked, which she said isn’t true. 

“I understand the fear of retaliation, but I want graduate workers to know that our union has their back and support and that a lot of the messaging that’s coming from the university is just either wrong or illegal,” Vailhe said. 

Vailhe said students and workers are welcome to join the picket line at the Arbor on campus and can come to ask questions if they have concerns about the strike.