Statement of Support for UC Graduate Students

Statement of Support for UC Graduate Students UCSF Faculty October 24 2022 As faculty members in graduate programs at UCSF, we strongly support the efforts of our students and their union to obtain wages that allow them to afford to live in San Francisco, obtain public transit passes, receive childcare reimbursements, enjoy equitable disability services, protection from visa abuses for international scholars, security of employment, and protection from abuse and retaliation from abuse reporting. These are matters of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion, which are not simply a set of evaluative standards for our Institution's faculty and staff, but need to be action items for our administrators and executive leadership. If UCSF is to remain a desirable place to study then this must also be a place that is desirable for employment, particularly when many students depend on campus employment to make their education possible. By paying our graduate workers more, providing them with access to subsidized housing, transportation and childcare, we will attract and retain the most promising scholars from around the globe, regardless of their financial capabilities. As graduate program faculty, we support our own graduate student employees and those across the University of California who are seeking fair employment contracts that include cost of living increases. We express these words of support now, in hopes that the UC can avoid a collective labor strike. We also pledge our support to student employees who may find it necessary to demonstrate their commitment to the UAW2865, UAW5810, and SRU-UAW proposals currently being considered (Fall 2022). We ask UCSF and the University of California to work urgently and in good faith with the student union. We believe we all have the same goal: to make impactful discoveries in science and in health and preserving this mission through the supportive education of the next generation. We are all in this together. Drafted by: Noelle L'Etoile, Sara Suliman, Dean Sheppard, Susan Lynch, Tomasz Nowakowski, Guo Huang, Mercedes Paredes, Carlo Condello, Rachel Rutishauser, Joanna Halkias, Nadav Ahituv, Minnie Sarwal, Andrei Goga and Alexis Combes. Undersigned are UCSF faculty in support.