Stand with Student Workers at Dartmouth:Support our Strike!!

Student Worker Collective at Dartmouth (SWCD) Is STRIKING!!! Urgent Solidarity Actions Needed!!!

Last week, SWCD successfully passed a Strike Authorization Vote with 91% of workers in support, and rejection of Dartmouth's last, best, final offer by 88% of our unit. We have been left with no other choice but to escalate as Dartmouth College has refused to continue bargaining with us and have not responded to our final offer for UGAs and DDS workers. We began our strike as of Monday May, 19th!!!!

Urgent Solidarity Actions are Needed!!! We are facing aggressive pushback from Dartmouth and need to be able to promise our workers support over the coming weeks. Please help us in our fight against an institution that has the resources to meet our demands but refuses to cede to the needs of the student workers collective. Please contribute to our hardship fund to support student workers that are determined to strike but desperately need funds as the year comes to a close.

SWCD Background – Plus a Brief Note About Other Unions on the Dartmouth Campus

The Student Worker Collective at Dartmouth (SWCD) formed as an independent union in 2022 when Dartmouth College Dining Services (DDS) undergraduate student workers voted unanimously to unionize via an election conducted by the National Labor Relations Board. After a stalemate in bargaining for a first SWCD contract (as management seemed to not take the SWCD very seriously), the union membership voted overwhelmingly to authorize a strike on a certain date and time. Just hours before the strike was to become a reality, the College management accepted the SWCD demands, resulting in a ground-breaking first contract.

At that time, the “union family” at Dartmouth included the approximately 50-year-old SEIU #560, primarily made up of building services and facilities operations workers and non-student dining services workers; IATSE technicians at the Hopkins Center Theater; and a unit of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) on campus that does not collectively bargain with the Dartmouth administration.

The SWCD success triggered a spate of new union organizing and union interest at Dartmouth – with the Graduate Organized Laborers of Dartmouth (GOLD-UE), Dartmouth Library Workers (AFSCME), Hood Museum visitor guides (SEIU #560) and Child Care Workers (SEIU #560) subsequently unionizing in short order.

This unionization boom also triggered the College’s hiring of a new lead negotiator (official title: Associate General Counsel/Associate VP, Labor and Employment) who previously served as a partner in two “union-unfriendly” law firms that boast of guiding their employer clients in “winning union elections” (meaning workers lose!) or “averting union elections altogether.”

In 2024, Dartmouth’s Undergraduate Advisors or UGAs (which most other colleges call resident advisors/assistants voted in an NLRB election to become a part of the SWCD.

2024 to 2025 SWCD Contract Negotiations

The SWCD original 2-year contract expired on March 18, 2025. As negotiations continued, the SWCD requested continued dialogue and an extension of the original contract. while bargaining continued. For 7 months, SWCD have put forth proposals that solidify

base pay of $23 per hour – i.e. fair compensation for SWCD workers that adequately takes into account tuition increases and the cost of living in the Upper Valley;

fair working conditions;

work location safety, health and privacy protections (especially for the many international students in the bargaining unit who face ever-present threats from ICE/U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement);

enforceable job protections in the face of DDS attempts at job-destroying automation;

fair calculation of UGA compensation packages (including housing and meals) and not confusing a UGA’s financial aid package with compensation for UGA labor; (and more….)

After observing several bargaining sessions between Dartmouth management and SWCD (as allowed per joint agreement), external observers have questioned if there is any genuine interest on the part of the College in actually reaching an agreement or if the basic management bargaining strategy is to frustrate and undermine the SWCD altogether.

During the April 17th bargaining session, attended, in person or by Zoom, by well over 40 student and community observers, the SWCD team presented numerous written proposals in which the management team seemed to have little interest, and the lead College negotiator then presented an already-written “last, best and final offer.” Four days later (in an April 21 email), the College’s lead negotiator indicated that Dartmouth would no longer engage in bargaining sessions and that the College would NOT extend the original contract any further, despite specific SWCD requests otherwise.

After Dartmouth College’s arbitrary refusal to continue contract negotiations or to meaningfully consider the SWCD’s written proposals, the “last, best and final offer” of management was put to a union membership vote with 88% calling for REJECTION of the College proposal and 91% voting to authorize a STRIKE. Here is the SWCD’s May 14th message to Dartmouth management after these votes.