Since 1974, Graduate Student Instructors and Staff at the University of Michigan have fought for and won higher pay, healthcare, and better working conditions through the Graduate Employees Organization, GEO. After 50 years of organizing, GEO has succeeded in securing an election to extend these protections to Graduate Researchers. If passed, the March 25, 2026 election would grant Graduate Student Research Assistants (GSRAs) the right to unionize and bargain together with our Graduate Student Instructor counterparts, as well as maintaining our union rights when switching between these two job titles.
This monumental step comes as a result of years of grassroots organizing at the department level, culminating in a campaign to collect over 1,600 unionization cards. These cards were submitted to the Michigan Employment Relations Commission (MERC) on December 10th, 2025. MERC informed us that those 1600 cards surpassed the 30% minimum threshold, officially securing an election for GSRA inclusion in GEO. This overwhelming show of support highlights the desire for contractually guaranteed protections from issues graduate researchers face—from unfair dismissal and abusive advisor relations to loss of research funding and the incessant targeting of international workers.
Despite the strong show of interest demonstrated by our petition, the University of Michigan responded by immediately calling our right to collective bargaining into question. This was done by 1) outright refusing to acknowledge Fellows as employees, stating they are merely “students receiving financial aid” and 2) claiming they cannot identify which grad workers are Fellows and thus cannot produce the list of eligible workers they are legally obligated to create. This was despite the fact that graduate workers systematically assembled a comparable list to aid our unionization effort, without having access to the university’s vast internal systems for disbursing salaries, health insurance, or grants.
While the University agreed to an election for GSRAs only, the University would force us into a lengthy legal battle if Fellows were to be included as part of the union. This meant we were faced with an important moment of collective decision-making. Graduate workers across departments and job titles came together last month to determine which path would best enable us to fight for each other. The question of Fellows’ unionization was one of when rather than if, given near unanimous agreement that Fellows are employees deserving of union rights. Over 600 graduate workers then voted on the researcher accretion timeline, with over 90% deciding to pursue GSRA unionization as soon as possible and continue fighting for Fellows as part of a future campaign.
When forced to reckon with how the legal structures surrounding labor organizing fail to reflect our reality, graduate workers at the University of Michigan will not stray from our commitment to supporting each other. We continue to move forward on the path that builds our collective power over the long-term and enables us to work with the dignity and safety that we deserve. After nearly 2 years of ongoing efforts to unionize graduate researchers, our collective efforts have culminated into a March election to recognize GSRAs as part of GEO’s bargaining unit. As always, the fight continues.
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