Arbitration of a grievance between members of the Graduate Employees Union and MSU officials has been postponed.

The final step of the union's grievance procedure was set to occur Wednesday, but heavy snow prevented the Southfield-based arbitrators from making the trip to East Lansing, union President Scott Henkel said.

A new date has not been set.

"We have been talking about this for so long, since August," Henkel said. "We were all ready for this."

Provost Lou Anna Simon said the delay does not change the university's approach to the dispute.

"This is just simply a scheduling change," Simon said.

The dispute between the MSU Administration and the union is over the contract's language. The contract states employees will receive higher pay when they have received a master's degree or equivalent and have at least four semesters' experience as a teaching assistant.

But union officials say several colleges within the university require teaching assistants to have at least eight or 12 semesters of teaching experience before they can receive higher pay.

The MSU administration and the GEU will present their cases to an arbitrator who should make a decision on the case 60 days after the hearing, Henkel said.

About 1,200 graduate teaching assistants are represented by the union, which signed its contract with the university after teaching assistants walked off the job for one day last April.