Staff at Mills College are following in the footsteps of the Oakland liberal arts institution’s adjunct faculty members by unionizing as part of a broader organized labor trend in Bay Area higher education.
Last month Mills staff announced the campaign to unionize with Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 1021, which also represents Mills faculty and this year organized staff at California College of the Arts. Organizers say the effort has widespread support on campus and estimated more than 200 employees are eligible for the bargaining unit.
On Thursday, members of the staff organizing committee, joined by a student supporter, delivered a letter to Elizabeth Hillman, the school’s president, requesting the administration voluntarily recognize the union in order to avoid a costly, potentially contentious election process through the National Labor Relations Board. “We seek to cultivate a partnership with College administration that honors the overwhelming support for unionization among Mills staff,” it reads.
“When it comes to labor unions, Mills embraces the democratic principle of free and fair decision-making by employees,” said Hillman, who’s led Mills since 2016, in a statement to KQED. “We’re now assessing how the possibility of unionization would affect our efforts to work together with our faculty and the entire community to ensure a sustainable future for Mills.”
Workers in various departments say they’re organizing for higher wages, stronger benefits and greater representation in institutional decision-making as Mills rebounds from a “financial emergency” two years ago. Like faculty and staff at other local colleges to unionize in recent years, they’re motivated to address issues such as wage stagnation, with incoming employees earning more than longtime ones in similar roles, by the rising cost-of-living in the Bay Area.
