Sisters and Brothers:
At Rutgers University, more than 20,000 unionized faculty (all AAUP members) and staff are currently in negotiations and working under expired contracts. They have gone at least three years without a raise while the cost of living, particularly health care costs in the state plan, have risen dramatically. Rutgers management is sitting on hundreds of millions in reserves while the hardworking faculty and staff are falling behind. Now management has cancelled the bargaining sessions that were scheduled for this week. We must take action!
If you are in New Jersey, please join in a lunchtime action at 12:30pm this Thursday in support of our union brothers and sisters at Rutgers. Locations listed below; RSVP to reclaimrutgers@gmail.com.
If you can't come in person, then please take a moment to snap a picture of yourself and as many other union members and supporters as you can find. Please download our Reclaim Rutgers sign at http://www.aaup2.org/ReclaimRutgersrally.pdf and wear your union colors or hold your union banner. Then send your photo to reclaimrutgers@gmail.com to be included with all the other supporters. Please feel welcome to include a solidarity message from your union along with your photo. Selfies from individual members are also encouraged!
That's the action that thousands of us will be taking state-wide and across the country this Thursday in support of the hardworking women and men of Rutgers.
In Unity,
Howard Bunsis
Chair, AAUP Collective Bargaining Congress
Locations for the Oct. 23, 12:30pm-1:30pm Reclaim Rutgers action on each campus and at Rutgers off-campus worksites are:
Busch campus (Piscataway): outside Faculty Dining Center
Camden campus: Campus Center Plaza
College Ave campus (New Brunswick): center of Voorhees Mall
Cook/Douglass campus (New Brunswick): Douglass Center Plaza
Livingston campus (Piscataway): Livingston Student Dining Center Plaza
Newark campus: Paul Robeson Center Plaza
Newark-RBHS: Corner of 12th and Bergen
New Brunswick-RBHS Downtown: 335 George St (Liberty Plaza)
Piscataway-RBHS: 151 Centennial Ave. (UBHS) AND 671 Hoes Lane W (UBHS/RWJMS)
Somerset-RBHS: 1 World's Fair Drive
The AAUP-CBC supports unionization as the most effective means for academic employees to protect shared governance and academic freedom, to uphold professional standards and values, and to promote higher education as an investment in our common future. Visit the AAUP-CBC website.
http://www.aaupcbc.org/