Vanderbilt’s recent vote to unionize non-tenure track faculty is up in the air – despite the fact that the majority of lecturers and adjunct professors voted no. Apparently, a significant number of the ballots are being challenged, and the NLRB now needs to hold a hearing to determine which ballots are credible. A little further north, Graduate Students United withdrew its request for a mail-in ballot to organize graduate students at the University of Chicago. It will instead be pursuing an in-person election in the fall. The union claims they were forced to make this decision after an NLRB hearing went on for 10 days due to “stalling and obstructionist tactics by the University.” The University counters that the points it raised were obviously substantive or else the NLRB would not have granted a hearing or asked for written briefs from both parties.
