The following are committees that meet and/or communicate regularly throughout the academic year. If you wish to join a committee or have questions, contact graduatestudentsunited@gmail.com. You can also check out our calendar for regular meeting times. If there’s a committee that should be here but isn’t, write to us if you would like to help in setting it up!
Steering Committee
The Steering Committee is our main day-to-day decision-making body, subject to the oversight of the general membership. Our co-presidents, general secretary, communications secretary, financial secretary, divisional representatives, and committee representatives have a seat on Steering. The Steering Committee meets every week, at a set time every quarter, and meetings are open to all members. To find out how to bring something to the agenda, reach out to your departmental organizers, or contact GSU via social media or email.
Contact: Email GSU at graduatestudentsunited@gmail.com for further information.
Organizing committee
The Organizing Committee is the central hub for department-level organizing in GSU. OC provides a space for reporting and brainstorming on issues in your departments and developing strategies for organizing our fellow graduate workers to tackle those problems together. Ongoing, regular organizing in our departments is one of the best ways to build our union and develop the close relationships of solidarity that are needed to make our work effective. Anyone can get involved with Organizing Committee by becoming a Departmental Organizer, and we offer regular Departmental Organizing 101 trainings to help you get started. You don’t have to have any experience to become involved: trainings and collaborative meetings are geared toward building your skills and developing your organizing.
Contact: Email GSU at graduatestudentsunited@gmail.com for further information.
Communications Committee
The Communications Committee manages our social media platforms, edits and disseminates GSU literature, keeps our members up-to-date with a weekly newsletter, and liaises with the press on union issues. We are a task-based committee and are always looking for new members with editing, writing, speaking, and graphic design skills to help support the day-to-day maintenance of our union and winning our campaigns!
Contact: Email Laura Colaneri at graduatestudentsunited@gmail.com for further information.
mutual aid committee
The Mutual Aid Committee is dedicated to advocating for a committed practice of solidarity with our neighbors in and around Hyde Park, who have been the most severely harmed by the University while having the least power over University actions. Through practicing mutual aid, we believe we can manifest the better world in which we believe and build a new university founded on the principles of collective struggle. In addition to allied labor unions, we work with abolitionist and anti-capitalist organizers, and all those struggling towards collective liberation. We strive to work closely with other mutual aid initiatives in and around Hyde Park to redistribute resources across our community; strengthen our relations with other organizations in and around Hyde Park towards greater solidarity against all forms of repression on the basis of politics, class, race, gender, sexuality, and ability, and toward projects of reparation, abolition, and liberation; and pressure the University administration to abolish systems of oppression and instead, create sustainable infrastructures of mutual aid for our communities to thrive. Initiatives over the past year have included stocking the 55th Street Love Fridge, providing free meals for graduate parents and caregivers, and working closely with campus and South Side abolitionist organizations around the campaigns to Defund CPD and UCPD.
Contact: Email gsu.mutualaid@gmail.com for further information.
anti-racism working group
The Anti-Racism Working Group (ARWG) aims to embed anti-racism into the fundamental structure and processes of GSU. The group, which is made up of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) and white students, attempts to work collectively and non-hierarchically in the spirit of abolition and transformative justice. We acknowledge that, as University student workers, we participate in institutionalized systems of white supremacy, capitalism, and imperialism that extend from the South Side of Chicago to the global stage. We encourage members to engage in self-reflection and to pursue personal as well as organizational transformation. As a working group we aim to foster a culture of community-building, care, and healing; BIPOC-led work space that actively decenters whiteness; productive critique and mutual learning; and training and study in order to continuously reevaluate and reaffirm our principles and goals. You can read our vision statement here.
Contact: Email arwg.gsu@gmail.com for further information.
Care and Accountability Committee
The Care and Accountability Committee (CAC) was formed to address conflicts that often arise in principled organizing work in a way that promotes healing, understanding, and accountability in our union and minimizes harm. We provide spaces for informal personal check-ins, confidential conversations and mediated meetings, and we aim to work collaboratively to address systemic issues within the union. As a member, you can help us do this important work, build our capacity as a committee, and envision new ways forward. For more information on the committee, click here.
Contact: Email care.gsu@gmail.com for further information.
worker action committee
The Worker Action Committee plans and coordinates collective actions, including mass mobilizations such as walkouts, marches, rallies, and smaller rapid-response actions. Depending on the event, coordinating responsibilities can include training major event roles (police liaisons, building captains, marshals), coordinating logistics of events (location, dramaturgy, materials, etc.), and organizing large-scale turnout plans.
Contact: Email graduatestudentsunited@gmail.com for further information.
Hardship fund ad-hoc committee
This committee handles the administration of GSU’s Hardship Fund and meets on an ad-hoc basis to respond to applications for funds. It is overseen by three co-chairs, one of whom is GSU’s Financial Secretary. Meetings to approve the distribution of funds occur on an as-needed basis and are open to participation from all GSU members.
Contact: Email graduatestudentsunited@gmail.com for more information.
UChicago Graduate Students United - United Electrical Workers 