Through indirect sources (an email between our member and Vice Provost for Graduate Education Kelly Jordan-Sciutto), our union has learned that Graduate Student Resident Advisors who also perform research or instructional services may be forced out of their position by Penn. This illegal, unilateral action by Penn seeks to leave dozens of graduate workers without stable housing and significantly undermine their ability to make ends meet, while terminating the important contributions grad RAs make to their college houses. We have asked Penn HR to verify whether this is happening, with no answer for more than a week.

For years, Graduate RAs have been valued members of the Penn community. Penn’s administration has never articulated concerns about the performance or viability of GRAs. Now, without any justification, the University has mentioned to some GRAs that their colleagues who perform research or instructional services will be categorically barred from contract renewal.

This is the latest move in Penn’s escalating campaign against organized labor. United RAs does not believe it is a coincidence that Penn is punishing the same population of graduate students represented by GET-UP, who are currently fighting for a union contract. Frankly, Penn’s administration is playing politics with the lives of its own students. The administrator who decided to dismiss dozens of GRAs will enjoy secure housing this fall, while the graduate workers they displaced will not.

United RAs at Penn will not stand idly by. An attack on any of us is an attack on all of us. We will fight to overturn this capricious policy change. We will fight to reverse all punitive actions taken by Penn’s administration. And we will not stop fighting until all RAs are adequately supported and compensated in line with the importance of their work.

We demand that Penn freeze this policy change and issue an apology to all GRAs. We also demand that Penn reinstate summer housing for graduate RAs, a policy that has been occurring for decades which has also abruptly ended against our contract and past practice.