The Graduate Employee Organization (GEO) is a unit of United Auto Workers Local 2322 (UAW 2322), representing Research Assistants, Teaching Assistants, Teaching Associates, Project Assistants, Interns, Trainees, Assistant Residence Directors, and Working Fellows at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Graduate students on our campus have been organizing for a union since the 1970s. GEO was formally recognized as a union in 1990; we won our first contract in 1991 after a ten-day strike forced the administration to return to the bargaining table and negotiate in good faith.
(Watch GEO take their strike vote back in 1991 here!)
GEO is part of an amalgamated Local, UAW Local 2322. We work closely with our Local to enforce and expand the collective bargaining rights of graduate employees on our campus and throughout the state. Through the UAW, GEO is affiliated with the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organization (AFL-CIO), The Western Mass Area Labor Federation, and The Pioneer Valley Central Labor Council, as well as numerous other higher education unions in the UAW representing graduate employees, postdoctoral researchers, maintenance staff, and other higher education workers. We are also members of the Coalition of Student Employee Unions (CSEU), an organization of unions and organizing drives for student workers in the U.S. and Canada.
There are 27 units within UAW 2322, including two others here at UMass Amherst: the Resident Assistants and Peer Mentors (RAPMU) and Postdoctoral Researchers (PRO). Local 2322’s other members work in higher education, early childhood education, and human services positions. GEO’s union siblings include housekeepers at Mount Holyoke College, faculty and staff at Goddard College, teachers and bus drivers at Square One (Springfield Day Nursery), and counselors at ServiceNet. One new shop in our Local is currently bargaining their first contract: the law clerks at Cullen, Berger, and Klute, an immigration law firm.
We are one of the oldest and strongest graduate worker unions in the country. Our diverse and vocal membership has a proud history of prioritizing union democracy and taking direct action as the best avenue to meet the needs of our bargaining unit. Over the last several decades we have fought assertively for the realization of a highly progressive social agenda. We support the struggle of all workers, and stand in solidarity with other unions and progressive organizations in their fight for social and economic justice.
Not a member yet? Join today! Stand in solidarity with your fellow workers!
