Overview
- Graduate student workers began a walkout Tuesday, halting teaching, grading, and lab work, with picket lines at Harvard’s Cambridge campus and the Longwood Medical Area.
- The union is pressing for a $55,000 wage floor, the option for independent arbitration in harassment and discrimination cases, and stronger safeguards for non‑citizen students, while Harvard offers a 10% raise over four years.
- Following Monday’s short bargaining session that avoided wages and other core economic issues, union leaders confirmed the strike and scheduled the next talks for April 28.
- A key fight continues over who is in the bargaining unit, as Harvard says roughly 800 stipend‑funded researchers are not employees and the union maintains they are.
- The last contract lapsed in June 2025, cutting off some benefit funds for child care and medical costs, and this is the union’s third strike since it formed in 2018.