York U teaching assistants, contract faculty vote to strike starting Monday

Teaching assistants and contract faculty at York University have voted to reject the schools final contract offer, paving the way for a possible walkout starting next week.

“Our membership resoundingly rejected the concessionary and in some ways insulting offer that the administration provided,” said Julian Arend, the vice-president of Unit 2 of CUPE Local 3903.

CUPE Local 3903 says its membership has voted to begin a strike on Monday, however, they also have given their bargaining unit a mandate to resume talks over the weekend in an attempt to avert a walkout.

The union represents about 3,700 contract faculty, teaching assistants, graduate assistants and research assistants at Canada’s third-largest university.

Some of the sticking points for the employees have been health benefits and summer funding.

In a statement the university said it is consulting with the conciliator to determine if there is a basis for a settlement, adding they are willing to go to binding arbitration to resolve the most difficult issues.

“The situation doesn’t look good in terms of avoiding a strike. At this point it’s very likely that some sort of action will commence next week,” said Arend.

The possibility of a strike had some students worrying about their futures.

“It’s very shocking to me, it’s my last semester and my last year… I need this degree to start working,” said Omar Ali, a fourth year Environmental Studies student. “I have an exam I have to re-write, I’ve been studying for the past 2 weeks, I’ve missed work to prepare and I don’t know what to do. Do I study? Do I not study? I don’t know.”

“To be honest it’s frustrating because summer is the only time that I can actually work and put away money,” said Dragos Penela. “With the strike happening, they’re going to move all the exams further into the summer and I won’t be able to start my job.”

The last time there was a strike was in March 2015.

The union has been without a contract since Aug. 31, 2017

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