Email Template: copy and paste this template in an email to UIowa leadership. Let President Harreld, Special Assistant Fuentes, and Dean Keller know worker safety must be the priority for Fall 2020. Feel free to add or expand on specific objections you have!
Subject line: Protect Graduate Worker Safety!
Send to:
President Harreld, Special Assistant Fuentes, and Dean Keller,
The plans you have outlined for in-person classes and face-to-face instruction for the Fall semester put disproportionate risk onto graduate students and non-tenure track faculty. These measures will likely result in the university campus becoming a massive COVID-19 super-spreader zone. Holding in-person classes is irresponsible and presents a danger to graduate workers.
As a graduate worker, I am writing to demand you protect worker health and safety during the COVID-19 pandemic in the following ways:
- The University must move all Fall semester classes online to avoid the potential public health disaster that could accompany a fall reopening.
- The University Administration, led by President Bruce Herrald, must utilize all possible methods to protect international students from ICE and any other deportation organizations. The methods they will use should be clearly outlined and made known to the international student community at the University.
- No cops on our campus! Dismantle UIPD. Divest from police and state patrol. Our university must stop supporting violent institutions that put workers, students, and the Iowa City community at risk.
- No cuts, no layoffs: Protect people, not the endowment! A global pandemic is not an excuse for austerity measures that take away workers’ livelihoods when they need them the most.
- The University must ensure adequate work accommodations for graduate workers who are tasked with childcare, eldercare, or other domestic/private duties due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the associated job losses, layoffs, and adjustments to K-12 curriculum delivery.
- The University must immediately and directly include COGS/UE Local 896, graduate bodies of shared governance, and diverse graduate organizations in planning, decision-making, and information dissemination regarding operations at the University of Iowa for the 2020-2021 academic year.
[Your Name] [Your appointment] [Department you work in]