THE STRIKE - WHAT'S AT STAKE




Above(left to right): Strikers, York President Lorna Marsden and Ontario Premier Mike Harris.
Ever since the province deregulated graduate tuition, university administrators have seen charging unlimited fees on graduate students as another source of revenue. It is believed that the outcome of CUPE 3903's strike will set the trend for other graduate students across the rest of Ontario.


The York strike is a conflict between two parties:

York University's Administration - The Board of Governors (the employer)
and
CUPE 3903 (the employees).

It is rumoured that both York's Administration and CUPE 3903 are under political pressure from outside York University. Universities outside York want York's Administration to remove tuition indexation (see below) from CUPE's contract, so that they can charge unlimited tuition on all graduate students. Unions outside York University want CUPE 3903 to keep tuition indexation, as a defence against deregulated tuition fees.


While there are many issues in the strike, we have compiled a list of the top 3 outstanding issues:
 
1) TUITION INDEXATION

Tuition indexation is by far the biggest issue of the strike. Tuition indexation is when wages are increased in order to make up for increases in tuition fees. Tuition indexation is something that was already in CUPE 3903’s contract before the strike. York Administration wants to take this away from future graduate students.

York’s Board of Governors have promised to cap tuition increases to 2% per year until the year 2004. York has also agreed to provide "financial assistance" to cover some of the costs of rising tuition in the future. However, York still wants to remove tuition indexation from future graduate students.

Graduate students want to keep tuition indexation, because without it, any other financial benefit they have can be taken away by raising their tuition. Since the provincial government has deregulated graduate fees, York can increase their tuition fee by any amount they wish.

Assuming that York keeps it’s promise of capping tuition at 2% per year, it is estimated that it would cost less than $60,000 to keep indexation for next year. This is calculated as followed:


  • There are approximately 2,100 graduate students at York. Each of these students currently pay $4,509 in tuition, and are covered by tuition indexation while they go to York University.

  • 2% of $4,509 is $90. So it would cost $90 to pay for the increase in tuition this upcoming year.

  • Next year, it is estimated that there will about 500 to 600 new graduate students at York.

  • 600 X $90 is $54,000. This is how much it would cost to continue tuition indexation for future students.


    The above figure assumes that York Administration does not plan on increasing tuition by more than 2% a year, otherwise the cost would be much higher. Graduate students suspect that York Administration is planning for larger tuition increases in the future, and believe that this is why York Administration is taking away tuition indexation from their contracts.

    Graduate Tuition Fees (1991-2000):

    YEAR
    1991/92
    1992/93
    1993/94
    1994/95
    1995/96
    1996/97
    1997/98 *
    1998/99 *
    1999/00 *
    		 TUITION
    $ 2,067
    $ 2,299
    $ 2,460
    $ 3,356
    $ 3,692
    $ 4,421
    $ 4,421 *
    $ 4,421 *
    $ 4,421 *
    		 PERCENT INCREASE

    +11%
    +7%
    +36.4%
    +10%
    +19.7%
    +0% *
    +0% *
    +0% *

    * After tuition indexation

    It is worth noting that Osgoode Hall students, who are not protected by tuition indexation, saw their tuition rise by 20% last year: from $3,719.10 in 1999/98 to $4,648 in 1999/00. Tuition for new students entering the program more than doubled, to $8,000 per year.

     
    2) WAGES

    Earlier in the year, York Administration was offering a wage increase of 1%, while CUPE 3903 was asking for a 5% wage increase.

    Just before the strike, York Administration made a final offer for a 2% wage increase. CUPE 3903 dropped it’s request to 3.75%.

    CUPE argues that the increase is required to keep up with inflation, and make up for over 10% in lost income during 90’s.

    Inflation for the year 2000 is estimated to be at 2.7%.

    On Monday, December 19th, The Toronto Star reported that CUPE and York Administration had reached an agreement to a 2% increase.

     
    3) RESEARCH ASSISTANTS

    CUPE 3903’s membership is currently divided into 3 units:

    1) Teaching Assistants 2) Contract Faculty 3) Research Assistants & Graduate Assistants

    Research and Graduate Assistants are paid much less to do the same work that the other units do. CUPE is also concerned because there is a large discreptency in the wages of unit 3. For example, some graduate assistants are paid $4,500/year to do the same work that another graduate assistant gets paid over $8,000 to do. CUPE is worried that York will use the lower paid members of their union as cheap labour, to replace hirer paid employees.

    Graduate Assistants and Research Assistants currently earn as low as $4,500. The union originally proposed offering wages that start at $8,500. Since then, CUPE 3903 has lowered this to $6,762.

    In their last offer, York Administartion offered a minimum wage of $5,880 plus a $600 signing bonus for all graduate and research assistants.



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