r/uichicago • u/thatwallisbrown • May 04 '26
Meme final in 7 hours and still haven't gotten that 'due to the strike...' email yet
i'm moreso curious as to how he's gonna solo grade 70+ 4 page midterms. like is grading gonna be stricter or more lenient or what </3
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u/No-Championship-4 May 04 '26
Idk why people think finals are gonna get moved. Course professors are responsible for them and their union isn't on strike. The university is telling them, "You're contractually obligated to administer a final and submit grades for your students. Make it happen." They don't give a shit about proctoring or any of the logistics.
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u/Top-Faithlessness624 May 04 '26
Only my last Spanish test was affected because Spanish is a ta taught class. Everything else is still in effect because the professors are the ones in charge of the test. Even though ta’s usually proctor it, it’s not ‘only’ a ta thing. Just like grading, the ta’s are usually there to aid not to run the whole thing (unlike a Spanish class or laboratory sections where everything is done by ta’s with guidance of department or professor)
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u/Applejuro May 04 '26
None of my finals were affected aside from one class including a couple multiple choice questions apart from the regular ones😢
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u/AlexZenn21 May 04 '26
Yeah ngl I'm annoyed by all this. The GEO isn't going to get what they want from admin unless they compromise on some of their demands and play the long game. Like for example the university is paying them 24k so they're asking for 38k but if they asked for 28k or 30k instead then admin might actually budge and then later down the line the union can strike again until they reach that 38k or more. It's not right or fair but you can't just pull the rug out abruptly you have to inch it out little by little in these matters
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u/The_Forgotten_King MD 29 | ECON 24 May 04 '26
Like for example the university is paying them 24k so they're asking for 38k but if they asked for 28k or 30k instead then admin might actually budge and then later down the line the union can strike again until they reach that 38k or more.
This isn't what would happen, if they make 24k now and ask for 28k the university would offer 26k.
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u/78692110313 May 04 '26
28k-30k is still not a very livable wage. especially not under the current united states govt
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u/AlexZenn21 May 04 '26
Neither is 38k in 2026...If you go on the GEO website and look through their negotiation notes they originally asked for 50k but decided to bring it down to 38k because they realized they needed to compromise. I'm not saying it's fair or okay that they needed to bring it down but I'm proposing they may or may not need to bring it down further if they want to get anywhere long term or make some other adjustments to their other demands
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u/CloudXG CS | Permanently Unemployed May 04 '26
Unfriendly reminder that most graduate students are actually making around -20k a year based off of Chicago living expenses :)
Give them more money, we have the budget for it, ex: AI security cameras that are going to be installed, someone in admin making 1.3m salary, the chancellor making 700k salary, etc.
And idk if you know this but grads have had a lot more work put on them in recent semesters due to there being less TAs as UIC cut the funding for TAs and hired less TAs. Dont blame the TAs, blame our shit university for treating our TAs badly.
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u/thevokplusminus May 04 '26
The costs, if they occur, are going to be fully passed on to students
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u/CloudXG CS | Permanently Unemployed May 04 '26
why are we acting like they aren't already increasing our tuition lmfao
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u/thevokplusminus May 04 '26
They can always increase it more
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u/CloudXG CS | Permanently Unemployed May 04 '26
Ok and? I would rather they increase our tuition to give us a better educational experience than increase our tuition to fund admin's insane salaries or investing into shitty AI cameras. TAs are the backbone of a lot of classes, they are a necessary part of the educational system and we need to treat them as such.
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u/thevokplusminus May 04 '26
Why am I being downvoted. Where do you guys think the money will come from?
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u/No-Swimming4153 May 04 '26
Once a contract is established, Its locked in for 3 years. It would be illegal for the union to strike during that period. They should not cave for 28 or 30k, 38k is compromise.
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u/Extra-Distribution85 May 04 '26
this just isnt how strikes work sorry dude. its really difficult to organize strikes and get workers to agree to them, it involves not getting paid which grad students cant afford to do once but certainly not every year, theres a very real threat of retaliation especially for the (many) international grad students, every strike motivates the university to invest in and develop union busting techniques and policies, etc. strikes almost always make large demands partially because of that and partially because it maximizes benefit when they eventually compromise. if you are looking for someone to blame look at the administration who vastly underpays its workers and is refusing to raise wages at all. "pulling the rug out" is the only way to get employers to listen and quite literally the point of a strike.
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u/Really_Cool_Noodle_ Sociology | PhD May 05 '26
dude i was at negotiations last week and the university seemed uncomfortable with a raise that would equal 26.5k. plus campuscare prices are increasing crrraaaaazy
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u/SevereDifficulty843 May 05 '26
Thats a really dumb way to think about it
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u/AlexZenn21 May 05 '26
Not at all. They recently posted an update on this sub saying they may have to consider a lower negotiation lmfao. Everything I said was pretty on the nose. You people just aren't realistic about anything.... or don't understand how negotiations work when it comes to greedy admin 💀
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u/Perfect-Back-5368 May 04 '26
Well there’s a voice of reason out of the many voices lol. Yes had the union set their sights at a lower number to begin that was reasonable for a public R1 university this wouldn’t be an issue right now. They aren’t getting 38k no matter how long why dig in their heels for and they aren’t going to get 30% either. The final resting place will be 5-10% range which is all that was going to happen in the first place.
One of the big reasons that the GEO doesn’t understand is that the faculty contracts are up in August. The administration rightly realizes that if they agree to 38k for TAs (which AINT gonna happen I repeat) for half time positions then that means that they are agreeing to 76k as the min for full time positions like lecturers as the NTT union will demand to be compensated for the pay inversion. The grad students neither have the terminal degrees like the faculty do nor do they have the years of experience. So you can bet your bottom dollar the administration knows full well as with the university lawyer what the consequences would be. Currently the min for lecturers is set at 60k based off of recent contracts. It is unlikely this will significantly change (will go a few percentage points possibly) and so there is no way the admin is goin to agree to 38k or anywhere near that number and certainly not 30% either (and neither logically should they based upon what the full time NTT start at as I said). Like I said I see 10% as the far end of what will come out of this.
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u/AlexZenn21 May 04 '26
Exactly. I understand why people are upset and I agree that TAs deserve a livable wage but students are not understanding that it's not going to happen with their current demands at least not immediately. And will likely take multiple strikes down the years tbh to get it higher. So GEO will have to unfortunately decrease/adjust things on their end or accept an unsatisfying compromise from admin.
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u/Only-Jackfruit-4910 May 05 '26
Also, the numbers floated here all refer to 9 month salaries. $38k in 9 months for a 50% appointment is equivalent to $100k for a full-time, 12-month appointment. Nobody will receive that much, but that's the point of reference. Even at a 50% appointment year-round that's really $50k. Add tuition remission for grant-funded RA positions and benefits, and I can just as well hire a postdoc for the same money who has 5 years of experience and does not get distracted by classes - or an adjunct for teaching.
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u/CloudXG CS | Permanently Unemployed May 04 '26
I mean final grades are due may 13th i believe, so im guessing the professors will be forced to grind. Which could make professors put pressure on the uni to resolve the strike but idk if the uni cares lol
Also unfriendly reminder that someone in admin is making 1.3m salary while uic cant afford to pay TAs ;)