HELU’s Wall-to-Wall & Coast-to-Coast Report: January 2026

From Levin Kim, HELU Chair and member of UAW 4121:

The struggle for immigration justice and the struggle to re-orient higher ed for the public good are one and the same. Both institutions have long been driven by the same logics of austerity, contingency, and authoritarian control. I know, like many of us, that this work is personal.

My immigration story starts at Illinois State University and Heartland Community College in July of 2001 – before either the SEVIS database or ICE existed – and continues through various higher ed institutions. My experience of America is this patchwork of campuses that have become increasingly enmeshed with the immigration system over the last 25 years. Continue reading here.

• February 18 – HELU Open House 
• February 25 – HELU General Assembly, open to HELU members only. To join HELU, visit our website.

• ICE Out of MN Solidarity Fundraiser
• Sign GROW’s Open Letter on Purdue’s Graduate Admission Discrimination
• Support Sang Hea Kil, first tenured full professor fired from a public U.S. university for speaking out against genocide
• Alberta Labour History Institute’s February 23 film and online panel discussion: “Precarious Workers: Exploitation and Fightback”
• Join Labor Spring 2026

The turmoil around us can be confusing, but note that these seven articles are all either about wins or well-organized, long-term fightbacks. – Helena Worthen, co-chair with Evan Bowman, HELU Media/Comms

The fightback to reverse the firings of four adjunct faculty (“The Fired Four”) at Brooklyn College, targeted for their campus activism, has won an important victory. Three of the Fired Four have been rehired!

In Texas, faculty are rattled but determined.

Twenty-one unions formed a broad labor coalition called the Protect Utah Workers coalition to gather signatures and lead a referendum to repeal this law.

At the launch of our latest contract campaign, we partnered with the Inter Chicago Circle for Experimental Critical Theory to host a conversation among scholars of education policy, 21^st century technology, critical theory of finance, and the history of capitalism, so that theory could inform our approaches to key issues.

Faculty, students and other campus workers organized through AAUP, AFT, UCW and HELU are leading the resistance in order to keep accreditors independent.

We invite you to support HELU’s work by making a direct financial contribution. While HELU’s main source of income is solidarity pledges from member organizations, these funds from individuals help us to grow capacity as we work to align the higher ed labor movement.

We’re building a higher ed labor movement wall-to-wall and coast-to-coast. Time to dress like it! HELU hats, t-shirts, and hoodies are available now.