Harvard Academic Workers Will Strike Tuesday After Final Bargaining Session Ends Without a Deal

Harvard’s non-tenure-track faculty and researchers will walk out of classrooms and labs Tuesday for the first time, after a final bargaining session Monday ended without a contract agreement with the University.

Harvard Academic Workers-United Auto Workers – which represents about 2,600 preceptors, lecturers, teaching assistants, and postdoctoral researchers – set the Nov. 10 strike deadline on Oct. 19 after more than two years and 54 bargaining sessions without a contract.

J. Gregory Given, an Expository Writing preceptor and a member of the union’s bargaining committee, said Monday that the two sides have moved closer to a deal since then. But the remaining disputes – including wages – are core issues on which the University has made little progress, he said.

“What remains are a few really core issues where the union has made really significant movements from our original positions, and the university has made little to no movement at all,” Given said.

A Harvard spokesperson did not immediately respond for comment Monday night.

The remaining issues are across-the-board raises, family benefits on part with those of tenure-track faculty, the inclusion of hundreds of stipend-funded postdoctoral fellows who are Harvard contends are not University employees, and union security.

Given said the union has substantially reduced its compensation proposals, while the University raised its across-the-board offer from 2.5 percent to 3.5 percent over roughly nine months. At Monday’s session, the University said its full economic package amounts to an increase of more than 6 percent, according to Given. He disputed that figure, arguing that unit members would have received a 3 percent raise on July 1 if they were not unionized. The union has filed an unfair labor practice charge over the withheld raise.

“Their offer of a 3.5 percent across-the-board raise is actually an offer of a half-percent across-the-board raise for all of the trouble of this bargaining,” Given said.

Given said Harvard has repeatedly asked the union to accept standard no-strike and management’s rights provisions without agreeing to union security in exchange. Union security clauses, which generally require workers covered by a contract to pay dues or fees to the union, appear in every Harvard union contract except that of the Harvard Graduate Student Union-United Auto Workers, according to Given.

“It’s a standard handshake between labor and management, and they just refuse to stick their hand out,” Given said.

The two sides have agreed on most of the contract, Given said, including just-cause protections, grievance and arbitration procedures, layoff and severance provisions, workload protections, and a lecturer ladder that would replace the time caps limiting non-tenure-track appointments.

The union, which began bargaining in September 2024, voted to authorize a strike in July with nearly 94 percent support. The vote came months after its leaders called off a planned spring walkout amid low turnout in an earlier authorization vote.

The strike will disrupt courses that rely heavily on non-tenure-track instructors, including Expository Writing, Social Studies, and large introductory science classes. HAW-UAW members will picket Tuesday alongside striking graduate students, with joint rallies planned for 11 a.m. at the Zimmer Hall Plaza and noon in Longwood.

In a Nov. 6 letter to Harvard affiliates, Deputy Provost Jessica Soban and Paul Curran, Harvard’s managing director of labor and employee relations, wrote that the University would keep operating through a strike.

“The University believes a strike is unwarranted and remains committed to reaching a mutually agreeable contract,” they wrote. “However, should a strike occur, we will maintain continuity in teaching, learning, and research.”

“We continue to bargain in good faith, recognizing the vital role of our academic workers and our duty to preserve our academic mission,” they wrote.

Nicholas F. Bloom, who teaches History and Literature 98, wrote in an email to students in the course that the strike may be brief.

“Based on updates from my union, there is a high chance we will have class Thursday after this one,” Bloom wrote.

Responding to Bloom’s email, Given wrote in a statement that the union has not decided how long the strike will last.

“Our members are confident in our power to win a strong contract,” Given wrote. “While I can’t comment on any individual worker’s assessment of how long that will take, we have made no predetermination of strike length.”

HAW-UAW will be the second Harvard union on strike this fall. HGSU-UAW began its second strike of the year on Oct. 27, and Harvard University Dining Services workers voted to authorize a strike in October as their negotiations with the University stalled.

“None of us in the dining hall workers’ union, or the HGSU, or the HAW, have any illusions about how extensive the resources of Harvard University are, and it is just not plausible that they cannot do better for their workers,” Given said.

—Staff writer José Luis Ortega Castro can be reached at [email protected].