Isolated actions are not going to solve a systemic problem. Higher education workers of all stripes must unite. Tenured faculty in particular must build solidarity with their more precarious coworkers. Labor justice for campus workers and education justice for students and alumni go hand in hand. The future of our democracy, which depends on an […]
Protecting freedom of expression is vital, but it is useless to divorce disputes about the content of research and teaching from the attacks on the very structures of higher education that house, fund, and govern it. Supporters of free speech must work with and learn from labor organizers, debt resisters, community organizers, advocates for racial
Chronicle of Higher Ed: The Real Fight for Academic Freedom Read More »
Power Despite Precarity is a book to build with. It arrives just in time, amid campus labor upsurges and the formation of a promising new progressive labor coalition Higher Ed Labor United (HELU), where there is a new chance for strategizing a national movement.1 Drawing from lives of sustained practice, authors Joe Berry and Helena Worthen connect realms
New Politics: 25 Truths to Build Campus Power Despite Precarity Read More »
When I joined my first meeting of Scholars for a New Deal for Higher Education (SFNDHE) in January 2021, I was a bit awestruck. The group’s founder, Jennifer Mittelstadt, and charter members Eileen Boris, Marisa Chappell, Nan Enstad, Beverly Guy-Sheftall, Lisa Levenstein, Annelise Orleck, and Donna Murch, were all historians I had long admired. I was also
Labor: Scholars for a New Deal for Higher Ed Read More »
Higher Ed Labor United can build on more than 25 years of previous organizing—and starts off with a deeper base and broader vision. READ: Helena Worthen in Convergence: “Can HELU Ride the Tiger?”
Convergence: Can HELU Ride the Tiger? Read More »
“We are all campus workers”: New coalition confronts crisis in higher ed with coordination and collaboration READ: Tracy Berger, Aimee Loiselle, Trent McDonald, and Helena Worthen in Convergence: “Higher Ed Labor Unites for All: Faculty, Staff, and Students”
Convergence: Higher Ed Labor Unites for All Read More »
“How do we have power?” Stacy Davis Gates asked hundreds of academic workers on Zoom this January. The answer, she explained, was to “expand the definition of labor and union,” to bring in members of the communities in which Chicago public schools are situated, building coalitions to amplify demands and grow a movement for equity and justice—an approach called
Nonprofit Quarterly: Wall to Wall, Coast to Coast Read More »
Lifelong labor activists and higher ed union strategists Joe Berry (Reclaiming the Ivory Tower) and Helena Worthen discuss their vital new book, Power Despite Precarity: Strategies for the Contingent Faculty Movement in Higher Education. WATCH: Joe Berry, Helena Worthen, Linda Ai-Yun Liu, and Joe Ramsey on Shelter & Solidarity podcast
Shelter & Solidarity: Strategy for the Contingent Faculty Movement Read More »
We in the U.S. have never had a national strategy for dealing with the adjunct/contingent problem in higher education, even as this precarious workforce grew to nearly 75 percent of all faculty in colleges and universities. Instead, organizations have risen and faded, always confronting the competition among the traditional faculty unions. Higher Education Labor United
Labor Notes: A National Strategy for Higher Ed Labor Read More »
Disaster capitalism is being applied to colleges and universities at all levels, cutting classes while expanding casualization of the faculty. Not surprisingly, the mainstream media has chosen to focus attention on tenure, not on the overall conflict in the higher ed industry. READ: Joe Berry and Helena Worthen in New Politics: “Tenure Is the Easy Target
New Politics: Tenure Is the Easy Target but the Wrong One Read More »