HGSU Pickets Outside HUWU Bargaining Session

Striking graduate workers marched from the Yard to 124 Mt. Auburn St. on Friday afternoon to picket outside a Harvard Undergraduate Workers Union-United Auto Workers bargaining session.

HUWU-UAW, which represents students working in campus cafes, libraries, and the Harvard Foundation, unionized in October 2023. Negotiations over its first contract have stretched more than a year, with the two sides meeting only once in the fall semester.

”Our comrades, HUWU — the Harvard undergraduate workers’ union — is bargaining up there right now!” shouted Edan P. Larkin, a union organizer, to demonstrators outside.

The group blocked traffic on Massachusetts Ave. near the Harvard Kiosk before crossing into the Square and circling the building’s side entrance. Shortly after 2 p.m., police approached and told demonstrators that a driver had reported the group for blocking a private road. HGSU-UAW President Sara V. Speller said she did not notice any vehicles attempting to drive through.

Demonstrators then moved to the building’s front entrance, continuing to circle as smaller groups of union members joined in.

”I love HUWU,” organizers chanted. “Harvard, you should too!”

The bargaining session came amid a rocky stretch for the union. The Cambridge Queens Head Pub shuttered two months into negotiations, followed a year later by the closure of the Barker Cafe. A summer merger of the University’s diversity offices left dozens of workers uncertain about their employment, and the bargaining committee lost half its nine-member negotiating team to graduation in 2024 and 2025. Negotiations have picked up in recent weeks, with the two sides reaching a tentative agreement on shift scheduling.