Student employees at three University of California (UC) campuses recently voted to call a strike for the coming fall term. On May 1, members of the Association of Graduate Student Employees/United Auto Workers (AGSE/UAW) voted 77 percent in favor of striking at UC-Berkeley. Similar votes taken on May 14 by the Student Association of Graduate Employees/UAW at UCLA and on May 21 by the Association of Student Employees/UAW at UC-San Diego found 94 percent and 98 percent in favor of striking, respectively. At issue is whether the university should grant bargaining rights to student employees (R. Finn, The Scientist, April 29, 1996, page 1). The matter has been under dispute in California since the early 1980s. Research and teaching assistants (R.A.'s and T.A.'s) are not recognized as employees with collective-bargaining rights at any of the UC campuses. UC-Berkeley administrators recognize only a bargaining unit of student employees who...

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