MEMORANDUM

To: SAS Faculty

From: Samuel H. Preston

As you may have heard, a group of graduate students has threatened to strike this Thursday and Friday. The University will make every effort to minimize potential disruption. We expect to be fully operational and encourage you to hold classes on a normal schedule. It is possible that a small number of recitation sections or labs will be affected by the graduate students' actions. We hope that arrangements can be made so that classes and sections can be held as scheduled. If you believe that one of the classes for which you are responsible will be disrupted, we suggest that you consult with your department chair, undergraduate chair, or program director to determine whether and how to enlist available staff to meet affected courses or sections.

Several of you have asked questions about what you are or are not permitted to discuss with graduate students about the strike. Below are some guidelines that have been provided by the University.

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According to the National Labor Relations Board, faculty who have teaching assistants in recitation and lab sections of their courses are considered "supervisors" under the National Labor Relations Act. As a "supervisor," the law imposes some limitations on how faculty may interact with TAs.

These limitations can be summarized in the acronym TIPS. As supervisors, faculty are not permitted to Threaten, Interrogate, Promise or Spy on TAs with regard to their strike activity. Specifically, TAs may not be threatened (or retaliated against) for either engaging in, or refraining from engaging in, the strike. Although it may interfere with the ability to plan for this Thursday and Friday, faculty may not ask a TA if he or she intends to participate in the strike. A TA may not be promised any benefit for either refraining from striking or for participating in the strike. Finally, faculty are prohibited from spying on graduate students, e.g., eavesdropping, in order to determine which graduate students support or oppose the strike.

The law does permit faculty to talk to a graduate student who wants to talk about the strike. If a graduate student does volunteer whether he or she will be participating in the strike, faculty are permitted to act on that information. If asked, faculty may tell graduate students that the University will be open and running and that we expect all classes to run as usual. Also if asked, a graduate student can be told that it is both legal, and their right, to cross a picket line, and that the University will not permit any action on the part of the strikers to prevent people from studying or teaching.