Labor Board Bolsters UCLA Union Effort

The University of California should voluntarily recognize the fledgling union of its UCLA teaching assistants, according to a labor board ruling that says the graduate students should also be considered employees with collective bargaining rights.

The 2-1 decision released Monday by the Public Employment Relations Board strengthens the hand of graduate students who are to begin talks today with UC administrators as part of a cooling-off period that ended their systemwide strike.

“This should remove any remaining obstacles to union recognition,” said Elizabeth Bunn, a vice president of the United Auto Workers, which is affiliated with the graduate students’ union. “We are looking forward to meeting with the UC administration, especially now that the recognition issue has been upheld,” she said.

But UC spokesman Brad Hayward said the ruling conflicts with an earlier appellate court case involving UC Berkeley graduate students, and said UC lawyers will request that the legal issue be settled by an appellate court.

“We believe that a court review is appropriate,” Hayward said. “This decision is not the end of the road. It’s just one step in the process.”

The ruling is the latest in a series of decisions chipping away at the University of California’s position that the teaching performed by graduate students is an apprenticeship--and an essential part of their education--rather than a traditional labor relationship.

For that reason, the university has declined to recognize the unionizing efforts of 6,700 teaching assistants who perform the bulk of instruction to freshmen and sophomores at eight UC undergraduate campuses.

On Dec. 1, the teaching assistants, joined by some of the 2,300 tutors and readers who grade exams and papers, launched their first systemwide strike. It was timed to begin just before final exams to cause the greatest disruption.

The labor action ended four days later, when Assembly Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa (D-Los Angeles) and Senate President Pro Tem John Burton (D-San Francisco) brokered a 45-day cooling-off period and the series of talks that begin today.

At issue is whether state law enables the university to recognize the graduate student union. UC administrators note that the law specifically excludes students from collective bargaining if their work is a central part of their education.

But the ruling released Monday declined to make such a distinction between students and employees, saying that teaching assistants are both and can be afforded the right to unionize.

“Contrary to the university’s contention,” the ruling said, state law “presents a framework under which the pursuit of academic excellence, the free exchange of ideas, the preservation of academic freedom and collective bargaining all coexist and complement one another.”