Approximately 60 graduate, undergraduate, and post-doc workers rushed the stage of the 44th UC San Diego Alumni Awards last Friday to protest the university’s alleged violations of the newly-ratified union contract.
Immediately after taking the podium, Chancellor Pradeep Khosla was surrounded and presented with a cardboard sign reading “Most Overpaid Worker Award,” a reference to the chancellor’s recent $500,000 privately-funded pay raise resulting in an annual $1.14 million base salary.
The event was hosted by the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego in downtown La Jolla and attended by university administrators, professors, students, and high-status members of the community.
After a brief period marked by laughter, scowls, and shock, attendees were relocated to the secured interior of the museum while demonstrators continued chants such as “Pradeep, Pradeep, the rent is too steep!” from the stage. When police arrived, the demonstrators were escorted out and continued to protest from the sidewalk. No arrests were made.
A press release from representatives of the union claims numerous contract violations as the cause of the protest, emphasizing “The refusal to uphold the promise that graduate workers will be paid a minimum of $30,000 a year,” and “thousands in [owed] wages,” as a result of the university’s “refusal to pay workers for the 20 hours of work per week they are owed.” Last month’s announced reduction in the number of discussion sections in the school of biological sciences (resulting in “zoom-room” sections of over 300 students) was also mentioned...
Full story at https://ucsdguardian.org/2023/05/08/grad-student-demonstrators-crash-alumni-awards/.
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