University of Michigan Grad Students Strike over COVID-19 Policy

Student workers have cited a lack of transparency and a failure to implement rapid and widespread testing among their many concerns regarding the school’s response to the pandemic.

Written byAmanda Heidt

| 4 min read

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COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2, coronavirus, pandemic, University of Michigan, testing, students, strike, student union, graduate, undergraduate, residential advisers

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Update (September 18): Students at the University of Michigan have reluctantly ended their strike, noting in a press release reported by Inside Higher Ed, “We won workable pandemic childcare options; substantive support for international graduate students; transparent COVID-19 testing protocols; and incremental but real movement on our policing demands.”

Graduate students and residential advisors at the University of Michigan have gone on strike over the school’s COVID-19 response plan, prompting the university’s president to seek a court-mandated temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction to force students back to work.

The student workers are striking with the support of their union, the Graduate Employees’ Organization (GEO), which represents more than 2,000 graduate student instructors and staff assistants. Since September 8, they have been joined by more than 100 residential advisers in arguing that the university did not provide adequate COVID-19 protections.

“I personally have not spoken to ...

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Meet the Author

Amanda Heidt
Amanda first began dabbling in scicom as a master’s student studying marine science at Moss Landing Marine Labs, where she edited the student blog and interned at a local NPR station. She enjoyed that process of demystifying science so much that after receiving her degree in 2019, she went straight into a second master’s program in science communication at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Formerly an intern at The Scientist, Amanda joined the team as a staff reporter and editor in 2021 and oversaw the publication’s internship program, assigned and edited the Foundations, Scientist to Watch, and Short Lit columns, and contributed original reporting across the publication. Amanda’s stories often focus on issues of equity and representation in academia, and she brings this same commitment to DEI to the Science Writers Association of the Rocky Mountains and to the board of the National Association of Science Writers, which she has served on since 2022. She is currently based in the outdoor playground that is Moab, Utah. Read more of her work at www.amandaheidt.com.
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