Harvard Grad Union Contract Expires With Months of Negotiations Still Ahead

Harvard’s graduate student union contract expired on Tuesday with the end of the fiscal year amid ongoing negotiations with the University for a new agreement.

Negotiations for Harvard Graduate Student Union-United Automobile Workers’ third contract began on a sour note after the University canceled its first bargaining session in February — and tensions have only increased as Harvard navigates a legal confrontation with the Trump administration.

According to HGSU-UAW President Sara V. Speller, negotiations for the new contract will likely last for several more months, possibly leaving workers without a contract into 2026.

Despite a seemingly long road ahead, the prior contract’s expiration on Tuesday opens up the ability for the union to strike — a tactic that HGSU-UAW has used in both sets of previous contract negotiations to ramp up bargaining pressure.

Speller wrote in a statement that HGSU-UAW is “dedicated to getting the best contract” possible for its workers, and that “the decision to strike will be made by membership if and when the time comes.”

The University canceled the first bargaining session in February, unconvinced that the union would not bring members outside of its bargaining committee to observe the meeting. After debating the issue for two more sessions, both parties agreed to move on without defining ground rules — a first for HGSU-UAW.

Since then, issues adjacent to Harvard’s battle with the Trump administration — which has been defined by federal funding cuts and threats to the University’s ability to enroll international students — have appeared in bargaining sessions.

HGSU-UAW and the University recently clashed over international worker rights and non-discrimination protections. Earlier this month, Harvard presented a contract counterproposal that consolidated its control over discrimination and harassment procedures by referring HGSU-UAW to University policies — which could be subject to change under pressure from the Trump administration.

Even as the negotiations drag on, Harvard has again appealed a ruling that it violated its contract with HGSU-UAW by excluding roughly 70 lab-based psychology workers from the union’s bargaining unit, referencing the precarity of international workers’ positions in its arguments.

“I can’t imagine what it’s like to be on the administrative side of the University at this time, with all of the funding cuts, all of the threats towards international students, having to negotiate and work with the Trump administration — but what I have seen is a set of bargaining where the union presents articles and the University’s response to those articles are laughable at times,” Speller said.

Since the union and the University are building off a previous contract, they can elect to leave some provisions untouched, only opening the articles that they deem most important to revisit.

The union has reopened ten contract articles thus far. Harvard has reopened one article on intellectual property and returned counters to two of HGSU-UAW’s proposals.

Several of the union’s reopened proposals reiterate requests it brought in previous contract negotiations, including third-party arbitration in all discrimination and harassment cases and a requirement for all represented workers to pay union fees.

These issues, paired with wage increases, have pushed members to go on strike twice before.

“We are doing our best to write proposals that we think mirror a lot of demands and needs that our workers have expressed to the University for years,” bargaining committee member Denish K. Jaswal said, “and so we hope that we don’t have to rehash the same arguments over and over again.”

Economic provisions, including wage increases, have yet to come to the table, but they will likely prove to be similarly contentious.

Labor attorney Shannon E. Liss-Riordan ’90 said that Harvard should be able to afford necessary wage increases, even while facing down funding cuts.

“The idea that Harvard couldn’t afford wage increases, even if it is under pressure by the federal government, is not very believable,” she said.

William A. Herbert, executive director of the Center for the Study of Collective Bargaining in Higher Education and the Professions at Hunter College, City University of New York, added that the cost associated with union contracts is “minuscule” in comparison to the amount of federal funding that has been cut.

A Harvard spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment on the University’s ability to pay.

HGSU-UAW is also negotiating alongside Harvard’s undergraduate workers union and its non-tenure-track faculty union, with custodians, security officers, and police officers all set to come to the bargaining table in the fall.

Harvard Undergraduate Workers Union-UAW, which has been negotiating since March 2024, and Harvard Academic Workers-UAW, at the table since September, have both presented proposals on non-discrimination, union security, and international worker rights similar to the HGSU-UAW’s.

According to Liss-Riordan, simultaneous negotiations like those occurring now present an opportunity for union coordination. This year, workers from several unions rallied in support of non-citizen workers and called on Harvard to draw on its endowment amid funding cuts.

At the same time, Herbert said that employers can use concurrent negotiations to pit unions against one another.

“From the employer’s perspective, they will also be looking to see whether or not there are wedges to be able to use,” he said.

The union’s next bargaining session is on July 11.

“I’m sure it’ll go back and forth, and ultimately, we will receive a contract that both parties can agree to — and both parties will be able to enforce — but the state where the University is beginning, I’ll repeat, is laughable,” Speller said.

A Harvard spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment on the University’s bargaining position.

—Staff writer Amann S. Mahajan can be reached at amann.mahajan@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X @amannmahajan.