Who Ya Gonna Call?
GAU can help facilitate a resolution to advisee-advisor conflicts by talking to Beth Meyerand, head of THIS URI department.
What is the URI Graduate School?
The contract says your Graduate Assistantship comes with a pretty long list of things you cannot be targeted for (even including your membership- hopefully- in URIGAU) What fundamental workplace right does this section protect?
What is the right to be free from discrimination
Shots, shots, shots, shots, shots, shots for everybody! Because with flu season coming on, if you aren't prepared, you might have to take THIS type of leave, of which you have 8 paid days of per academic year?
What is sick leave?
These types of medications can be acquired at Health Services for little to no charge
What is Over-the-counter
Believe it or not, and you will believe it, GAU spent over 6 months convincing HR that THIS clause needed to be in the contract in order to prevent supervisors from discriminating against their employees on the basis of race, color, creed, gender, gender identification or expression, sexual orientation, religion etc. Even Harvard's grad union doesn't have this in their contract.
What is the non-discrimination clause?
What is Human Resources/HR
Your PI says, “This experiment should be easy, you may not go home until it's done.” You say, “I've been trapped in this windowless lab for 20 hours straight.” Before this turns into a full-blown contractual showdown, the agreement says you can try to resolve the issue informally. What does the contract call your disagreement once it becomes official?
What is a grievance?
While the passing of Dolly Parton was considered by many to be a national tragedy, taking THIS type of leave would be frown upon, as no one in this room is considered an immediate family member of this late, great singer-songwriter.
What is bereavement leave?
URI Health Services does NOT implement this type of fee for attending appointments at their clinic
What is A Copay
Despite doing functionally the same work as a research assistant, THESE type of graduate students, funded by the NIH/NSF/NOAA on T32s, F31s, or GRFPs are not considered members of GAU and thus must pay for their own insurance, tuition, student fees, and parking permits while get none of the protected benefits from the contract.
Who are fellows or students on fellowships?
Being a member of GAU means you get access to THIS organization's uniserv, Grace Lynch, to help represent your case at the administrative level. Though, non-members can still get her help for the low, low fee of $85 per hour.
What is NEARI?
If you are going into a meeting with your supervisor where you think you might be disciplined or fired, better memorize this email uri.gau@gmail.com to let us and your supervisor know you're invoking THIS type of right. (It's happened in CELS before...)
What is your Weingarten Right?
August is the month with the most birthdays (9 months prior is December) and the month when the academic contracts start. So if you find yourself unexpectedly expecting around that time, consider yourself eligible to take THIS type of paid leave.
What is parental leave?
If you sustain an injury, Health Services can refer you to this type of treatment found on campus and in-network
What is Physical Therapy
Once a tentative contract has been negotiated between GAU and HR, the final document has to be approved by THIS group of individuals, made up of CEOs, venture capitalists, entrepreneurs, and no current URI academic. Fun fact: the chair of this group was also beefing with a URI satire instagram page earlier this week.
What is the Board of Trustees?
You hear from THIS URI department on a biweekly schedule and if you don't....well if you want to pay the bills on time, your next course of action ought to be emailing GAU.
What is payroll?
The GAU contract was negotiated on behalf of all 600ish GAs at URI. If you choose to talk to HR yourself to get a higher stipend, they'll likely tell you "nope, can't do that!" as that action would violate the clause against THIS type of bargaining.
What is Individual
Before this contract, GAs could not take any time off that wasn't specifically conditional or the unpaid 2 weeks of leave. Now, GAs get 1 day of THIS type of leave, which isn't much now, but at least it's good for one beach day a year.
What is one day of personal leave?
This benefit of your contract CANNOT be waived, even if you are under the age of 26.
What is Health Insurance? (You can have secondary insurance, but you cannot waive this benefit of the contract- use it!)
Being a GAU member is an opt-in process, which means paying dues that are THIS percentage of your paycheck. While GAU understands this may not be feasible for all GAs, we believe no job should pay so little that employees can't afford to spend on something they consider important and worthwhile.
What is 1.4% of your pay?
During negotiations, GAU sits across the table from a representative from one of each of these departments: the Grad School, HR, and THIS office.
The latter of whom famously said URI GAs cannot be paid the same stipend amount as GAs at UConn or UMass Amherst because "it is too aspirational to compare URI to these other R1 schools"
What is the Office of the Provost or the Vice Provost?
While technically not allowed under the contract, if push came to shove and GAU needed to shove, THIS type of extreme action may be called for, while the iron is hot.
What is a strike?
For anyone who thinks 2 weeks of unpaid leave isn't enough, if you choose to take THIS type of leave in which you are no longer a student at URI, your contractual benefits are suspended during your absence.
What is academic leave/academic leave of absence?
What type of specialty doctor can be accessed (with no extra fee) at URI Health Services if you decide you want to stop surviving off of Celsius and Dunkin Donuts?
What is a Nutritionist?
Previously, employee pay level progression was tied to student milestone progression, meaning if you didn't take your exams you could be in Level 1 purgatory for years. Now pay level is determined by number of THESE worked as a GA, with next year seeing only 2 needed to jump from Level 1 to Level 2, and Level 2 to Level 3.
What are semesters?