This page is where we will track our progress in bargaining as we begin collectively bargaining our first union contract. Check in here to review updates from the bargaining committee, as well as review various proposals made by both the Administration as well as from the Bargaining Committee.
Bargaining Updates
At bargaining today, Harvard Admin offered us a pay package that doesn’t even keep up with inflation, including: A wage freeze for last year and a 2.5% raise for the next two years (except for HMS postdocs who could get a $8000 [11%] pay cut). Deletion of any step system for wages. No commitment to maintaining health insurance…
Continue Reading Bargaining Update: Harvard’s compensation proposal: An unacceptable offer
tl;dr: In four bargaining sessions over the past three weeks, admin has made their most significant concessions in over a year. But it’s not near enough—we must keep pushing. Our Strike Authorization Vote remains open. If you haven’t yet voted, go vote now! As always, if you have any questions about what’s going on, please…
Continue Reading Pressure Works. Let’s Keep it up! (Bargaining Updates #34–37)
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: April 29, 2026PRESS CONTACT: Dr. J. Gregory Given Harvard Faculty Union Files Federal Labor Charge Against University Administration The charge, which comes as the Harvard Academic Workers (HAW-UAW) negotiates their first contract, alleges an illegal, unilateral increase of 50% to the workloads of teachers in the College’s Expository Writing Program. CAMBRIDGE, MA…
Continue Reading Harvard Faculty Union Files Federal Labor Charge Against University Administration
Remember to Participate in the Strike Authorization Vote! On Tuesday we had a particularly important bargaining session. We presented our Economic Package with 15 articles laying out our vision for the salaries and other economic benefits that we know are both necessary and long overdue. While there are significant outstanding non-economic issues that affect how our economic…
Continue Reading Let’s Get Paid What We’re Worth (Bargaining Update #32–33)
TLDR: Voting to authorize a strike opens on March 27th. Attend Cambridge and Longwood area town halls next week to learn more and make a plan to win a fair contract! Last fall, we delivered our Contract Now petition to Harvard administration insisting they bargain a fair contract, and we followed that up at the beginning…
Bargaining Update #31 Non-Citizen Rights HAW made it out to the ends of the Earth in Antarctica. And Tuesday our 31st bargaining session continued! Management has made it clear: we need to escalate. We saw incremental improvements in their Promotions article; however, we remain at odds over foundational issues of unit inclusion and job classifications. We are…
See All Bargaining Updates Here.
— Testimonials From Observers —
My name is Jing Cai, and I’m a Preceptor in Chinese in the department of east Asian languages and civilizations. The motivation for me to get involved in this union 5 years ago was simple: to have a more stable job, as we all deserve, and to live a fuller, more dignified life. By “dignified” I mean, not having to feel we are less because our employer treats us as disposable, dignified in the sense that none of our teaching assistants colleagues will have to tell their inflamed teeth to “hush” because they don’t have dental insurance, dignified in the sense that when we reach retirement age, we don’t need…
I have the same concerns as Jules and can contribute some perspective on the experience of STEM students. I teach as a lecturer in Physical Sciences 12A, in 15 series physics labs. As a result, I work with a broad segment of the STEM student population including physics concentrators, engineers, chemists, and pre-med students. In the last year their experience has been seriously impacted by layoffs, time-caps/disposability culture, and attempts to replace human advising with AI tools. When I first got here I was struck by all the resources available to students. There are amazing safeguards in place to make sure every student has access to high-quality advising, mental health…
Continue Reading Testimonial from outgoing Science Preceptor in FAS:
Last week, in the basement of the Barker Center, a group of students gathered to mourn the death of a program that Sara Feldman built, that I have helped to build, and that those same students have helped to build. Every single one of them spoke movingly about the impact that NTTF have made on them, impact often far out of proportion with our role here, out of proportion with our impermanence and our compensation. Some of them wept. The students in that basement gave us far more recognition of the situation we’re in than I’ve received at this table or from my supervisors. The Corporation’s counters on the issue…
Continue Reading Testimony from J.R., outgoing Lecturer in FAS:
Current Proposals With Latest Versions
Union is currently working on
Waiting on Admin responses
Completed Contract Articles
Bargaining Procedures (not in our contract)
All Passed Proposals
Below are all the articles that have been passed in negotiations. Generally, proposals are passed back and forth and move closer together. The more power we have, the more the administration will move towards our proposals until they reach a tentative agreement (TA). Once an article is TA’d, then it is done and placed aside until we have a full contract with all of the articles TA’d, at which point the members will have the opportunity to vote to ratify (or accept) the agreement, of reject it, allowing all the articles to be reopened and resume negotiations.
Our Path Towards a Strong Contract
As the Bargaining Committee, we will fight for a contract that makes Harvard more accessible, inclusive, and competitive by securing essential workplace protections and benefits, such as: salaries that keep pace with the rising cost of living in Boston, more appointment security to make these sustainable jobs, longer appointments, more rights and support for international workers, more cost-effective health benefits, paid parental leave, subsidized child care, enforceable protections against harassment and bullying, and more.
To ensure this, we will:
- Make every effort to keep all academic workers are informed throughout bargaining
- Encourage a majority of academic workers to participate in the process of winning a strong contract
We hope Harvard does not push back on key priorities as some other research institutions have. Either way, we know that in order to win the strongest possible contract we will need a strong majority of us to support the bargaining committee by actively participating in the process. Having the majority of all Academic Workers united behind the bargaining committee will give us the strength and leverage at the bargaining table to win a fair agreement with Harvard. We will use multiple strategies from our own and other campaigns to make it as easy as possible for you to stay informed and participate:
Grassroots organizing: We will continue to engage in local outreach to colleagues to help keep each other updated, informed, and provide lines of ongoing communication with the bargaining committee, building on the strong track record of majority participation and support throughout our campaign so far. If you want to get involved in organizing please let us know here!
Bargaining updates: We will provide regular, timely updates on bargaining sessions to keep you informed of which proposals are being passed, as well as any progress or challenges in the negotiations.
Regular town-halls: We will host regular town halls to update the unit on our progress, to get feedback on updated proposals and to answer any questions. Participation in these forums by as many Academic Workers as possible will be critical.
Open email communication: We remain committed to being responsive to the priorities and needs of all Harvard Academic Workers by answering any emails that you send to harvardacademicworkers@gmail.com with specific concerns in a timely manner. This includes your reports of unfair labor practices — these will be kept confidential within the bargaining committee and we will work with you to help find immediate solutions. Identifying unfair practices also helps us to make sure that the contract will prevent these practices in the future.
Topic-specific working groups: We plan to establish working groups as needed to provide support with the bargaining process. These groups will stay in regular contact with the bargaining committee in order to assist with research, give feedback on proposals, and drive issue-based campaigns that add to our leverage at the bargaining table.
Open negotiation sessions: While actual negotiation sessions will be between our bargaining committee and Harvard’s administrative team, we welcome interested supporters who would like to attend a session—we just ask that you reach out to us in advance by filling out this RSVP. We plan to bargain intensively to achieve the best contract as soon as possible and will post bargaining dates on our website as soon as they are scheduled. If you would like to observe in-person, please reach out to us at hawuawbc@gmail.com.
Sidebar conversations: “Sidebar” or off-the-record conversations between our bargaining committee and the administration can be a useful tool at the negotiation table when on-the-record negotiation reaches a roadblock, particularly for exploring underlying reasons for lack of progress that Harvard might not otherwise communicate. As a committee, we will make sure the entire bargaining committee is aware of the sidebar and agrees before using this tactic.
Bargaining Goals: We put great effort into incorporating as much feedback as possible into an inclusive set of initial bargaining goals to guide us in negotiations, drawing on surveys, electronic feedback, town halls, and hundreds of individual conversations, as well as best standards across the academic sector and other unionized institutions. We continue to gather feedback through comments written by Academic Workers as part of the goals ratification process.