Cambridge City Council Votes to Urge Harvard to End Faculty Time Caps

The Cambridge City Council voted Monday to back Harvard’s non-tenure-track faculty, urging the University to eliminate time caps on appointments and recognize workers’ rights to union representation as contract talks enter a second year.

The resolution, introduced by Councilor Jivan G. Sobrinho-Wheeler, called on Harvard “to acknowledge the labor contribution and employee status of all its researchers, regardless of funding source” and to bargain in good faith with the Harvard Academic Workers-United Auto Workers.

At the Monday meeting, Sobrinho-Wheeler said the system of fixed-term appointments leaves instructors and researchers in a state of chronic uncertainty, despite their role in teaching and research. He described the limits as arbitrary and said they create inequities based on how positions are funded.

The measure passed with eight councilors in favor and one, Councilor Catherine “Cathie” Zusy, voting present. She said she was sympathetic to the workers’ concerns but questioned whether the matter fell within the council’s role.

A Harvard spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.

The vote continues a pattern of involvement from the Council in Harvard labor disputes. Over the past decade, the Council has backed dining hall workers during a strike threat, urged raises for clerical and technical staff, and supported custodians in contract negotiations. Last November, several councilors joined a custodians’ strike, calling on the University to bargain in good faith.

Around that time, the council condemned Harvard’s removal of hundreds of workers from a graduate student union. Though such resolutions carry no legal force, councilors have argued that the city has a stake in how Harvard treats workers who live and work in Cambridge.

The dispute centers in part on so-called time caps, which limit how long non-tenure-track faculty can remain at Harvard. In the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, positions such as College Fellows, lecturers and preceptors are restricted to terms of two, three and eight years, respectively, and cannot be combined for more than eight years in total. The policy often forces out instructors who have spent years teaching core undergraduate courses.

The caps have become a major sticking point in negotiations between Harvard and HAW-UAW, which represents more than 2,600 postdoctoral researchers and non-tenure-track faculty. The union has been bargaining its first contract since September 2024, with fewer than half of its proposals settled.

Harvard has offered to eliminate caps — including in May 2025 and January this year — only if union members agreed to increased courseloads and minimum student requirements. HAW-UAW has rejected those proposals.

Compensation remains another point of content. The union is seeking a 20 percent wage increase and expanded benefits, proposals the University has not yet accepted.

With negotiations approaching 19 months, the union opened a strike authorization vote two weeks ago, raising the possibility of a work stoppage if no agreement is reached. The next bargaining session is scheduled for Tuesday.

—Staff writer Taylor M. Bierwerth can be reached at [email protected]. Follow her on X @tmbierwerth.