I am writing this letter to express my disappointment over the current anti-union tactics of the MSU administration regarding the unionization effort of teaching assistants and graduate assistants.

I have been a faculty member at MSU for 37 years and served as chair of the history department for four years. I have worked closely with numerous excellent teaching assistants and have been impressed by their dedication and hard work, and the often difficult circumstances they face as students and teachers in both their personal and professional lives.

As employees of the university, they deserve the right to make their own decisions about forming a union, without intimidation or misrepresentations from anyone, above all the MSU administration. In fact, the law requires that the administration remain neutral.

Unfortunately, the MSU administration has not behaved appropriately. In particular, I am disturbed by the administration’s Web site, on which it is suggested relationships between faculty and graduate students will be hurt if teaching assistants form a union. The administration is well aware that a union for teaching assistants will not necessarily have a negative effect on relationships between faculty and graduate students.

Teaching assistant unions have existed at the University of Michigan and the University of Wisconsin for more than 25 years, and relationships between faculty and graduate students are fine. In fact, most faculty are pleased that they are able to offer their graduate students adequate health insurance and pay, fair working conditions, and other benefits. I have heard faculty report their relationships with graduate students have been improved because certain problems have been resolved through the union process.

I have followed the debate over the effects of unionization on higher education for some time, and I am personally convinced there is no evidence that graduate student unionization will have negative results.

The important fact, however, is not my opinion about graduate student unionization. The important fact is that the administration has a moral and legal responsibility to allow the students to debate and resolve this question freely and without prejudice. The administration must remain neutral - which I do not believe they have done to date.

I urge the MSU administration to immediately cease in its unethical anti-union tactics and leave this important decision up to our teaching assistants and graduate assistants who are surely capable of making it for themselves.

Henry Silverman
history professor