We are building power at UW by forming our union
We are student facing Advising Staff at the University of Washington! We are taking action to raise the standards for our profession by improving our wages, benefits, working conditions.
We're organizing for EQUITY, and have UNITED to create a healthy work environment that elevates the professional standing of Advising; ensures pay equity; creates pathways for promotion; makes professional development opportunities accessible to all in our profession; creates sustainable workload expectations; establishes equity for advisers AND equity for students between departments
By organizing with SEIU 925, we are building power with thousands of our already Unionized classified and professional staff colleagues at UW.
Now is the time for us to build the power to fully advocate for our students and ourselves. The only way to truly do this is by coming together as a union.
Will you join us and take action to improve our university? Share your information and we will be in touch!
Why organize now?
Why wouldn't we organize now? We know that students stay at the UW because of the support and advocacy that we provide as Advising Staff. Despite this, we are experiencing catastrophic turnover, which is resulting in runaway increases to our workloads, demoralizing Advising Staff, and destabilizing our students. To make matters worse, many of us have gone years without meaningful pay increases and can no longer afford to live near our workplaces. We also lack clear pathways to promotion, so unless we choose to leave the UW and students we love, many of us cannot achieve the professional development we want and deserve.
Once we organize, we can win transparent processes for promotions. We can win salaries that keep up with the skyrocketing cost of living. And we can finally win the professional respect we deserve.
Here's what happens when exercise collective power! Professional staff at the UW have won:
- guidelines around reasonable workload expectations;
- pay increases allowing them to quit their second jobs;
- clear pathways to promotion;
- and countless other improvements.
Thousands of classified UW employees are already unionized. Over the last three years, professional staff have also successfully used their collective power to win systemic changes. Newly unionized groups at UW include IHME professional staff, Libraries and Press academic and professional staff, and research scientists. As more of us organize, we all gain agency.
It is time for to organize with our many UW colleagues in SEIU 925 and bargain for fair and equitable wages and working conditions.
Read more here
What are we fighting for?
Currently, whether or not we are able to thrive at the UW varies by school and department. Our working conditions and professional development opportunities should not depend solely on the goodwill of UW Administration, or on our program's funding. We deserve equitable opportunities and working conditions that empower us to serve our students as best we can.
Fair, Competitive Pay
We are organizing for FAIR PAY! The University of Washington is a world renowned institution with a multi-billion dollar endowment. Despite this, there is no consistent or transparent compensation for Advising Staff, and although many of us have similar job duties, experience, education, and titles, our pay varies wildly. Additionally many of us have been denied merit raises, causing our salaries to fall behind the skyrocketing cost of living in the Seattle area. The resulting instability means we are losing valuable colleagues to opportunities elsewhere that often pay better.
We are organizing for Fair Pay because our dedication and experience becomes a pay-cut when salary increases do not surpass inflation or the rising cost of living.
Professional Support, Pathways for Promotion, and Respect
We are organizing for PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT! We know first-hand that a student's success, positive experience, and decision to graduate at the UW is directly tied to the work we do as Advising Staff!
Despite this, Advising work is often misunderstood, and we are frequently not respected as being vital to the UW's mission. Our training is inconsistent, and we are often assigned tasks that are unrelated to our core responsibilities. Our workloads are constantly increasing, but our compensation and job titles do not. Finally, we have no transparent system for promotion, job security, or access to professional development.
We are organizing for Professional Development because we know that our students and programs benefit when all Advising Staff have access to trainings and upward mobility.
Equitable Treatment
We are organizing for EQUITY! Advising Staff often experience harassment, discrimination, and retaliation. Currently, we don't have a formal grievance process to address offenses. Most egregiously, the recent changes to WA law that should have increased all of our salaries to reflect the professional work we do have resulted in an arbitrary split in Advising Staff. The lowest paid are now hourly and being denied overtime. This hurts us and it hurts the students we serve.
We are organizing for Equity because BIPOC staff deserve greater support, visibility, promotional pathways, and professional development opportunities.
We are organizing for Equity because when Advising Staff receive varying levels of respect and support based on their department, then students experience unequal opportunities for success.
Control over Our Working Conditions
We are organizing for a VOICE IN DECISION-MAKING! Advising Staff had no voice in planning and implementing the move to remote operations, nor the return to campus. Even now, we do not have consistent or equitable access to remote or hybrid work options. More broadly, we have little control over other conditions of our work, such as privacy for confidential conversations, clean and healthy air in our offices, or our workloads and schedules. As some campuses switch to centralized Advising models during the time of our organizing, the UW now has an opportunity to meaningfully include our collective voice as Advising Staff when making decisions about our work.
We are organizing for a Voice in Decision-making because we are our students' best advocates and are best equipped to understand what they need to achieve success at the UW.
Something else you want to improve for UW advising staff?
UW advising staff are joining the ranks of already-unionized workers
The University of Washington has a long history of unionized employees, and thousands of UW employees are represented by a union.
"I believe everyone deserves a fair and consistent work environment."
I’ve worked at UW for two years, and I’m lucky to have had a good experience in that short time. I have a manageable caseload, a great supervisor, and a department that supports me seeking professional development. I’ve seen that many other advisers don’t have these things, and I don’t think that’s fair. I’m joining the union because I support my colleagues and I believe everyone deserves a fair and consistent work environment, regardless of where they are.
"We need a union to keep talented folks at the UW"
Adviser morale is at an all-time low on my campus. In the last several months, an unsustainable number of my advising colleagues have left or announced plans to leave the UW. Most cited inadequate compensation at the UW and fully remote work opportunities elsewhere as reasons for leaving. We need our union to keep talented folks at the UW, maintain continuity for our students, and stop the constant loss of institutional knowledge.
"Joining the SEIU 925 advising union will allow us to have [a] voice"
Working as an adviser with UW students in Tacoma is not just a job for me, it is a calling. Helping students, who have had few breaks in their lives, take charge of their future is my life’s work, and I am proud to be a part of furthering social justice in my community. My colleagues and I cannot continue to do our important work without having a meaningful voice in the decisions that affect our student advocacy work. Joining the SEIU 925 advising union will allow us to have that voice. A voice to advocate in the best interest of the students we work with, a voice to advocate for equitable and fair working conditions, and a voice to ensure that the advising profession on all UW campuses remains a vital part of the student experience.
"We deserve to have our time, pay, and working conditions respected"
As an adviser with more than 14 years of experience at UW, I fully support the unionization of advising professionals here. My colleagues and I provide crucial guidance, advocacy, leadership, and scholarship across the campuses, that support our students as they transition into, through, and beyond the university. We deserve to have our time, pay, and working conditions respected and reflect the level of the contributions we make to UW. We deserve annual pay raises, reasonable caseloads, professional development resources, and the ability to advocate for ourselves. Unionizing would support all of this and more.
"That’s why I support a union. This shouldn’t be luck"
I’ve been very happy in my current position for 25 years. What I thought would be a two-year transitional job turned into a career. My direct supervisors and department chairs have been fabulous – not only supportive of a work/life balance and in times of personal crisis but also actively, often creatively, looking for ways to make living in this area financially doable. My advising load has been manageable and my “other” duties have challenged me to learn new skills, allowed me to grow professionally, and been directly connected to supporting students. Pretty damn lucky, right? That’s why I support a union. This shouldn’t be luck. It should be every adviser’s experience.
"I support our union because I know that advisers play a huge role in student retention"
My first advising role was trial by fire - I had only half a day of training before being on my own in a department with no other advisers. While I appreciate the work of the Adviser Education Program and have since chaired the AEP Board, it is indicative of the university's priorities that advisers are hired into roles to support struggling students with almost no training and that what little training exists is infrequently available and relies on the labor of volunteers. I support our union because I know that advisers play a huge role in student retention - but to perform that role well, we must have adequate training.
"Our limited job protection creates complications in performing our work"
I am pro-union because we are called to advocate for and support our students through all the intricacies of their education - from the celebrations and delights to the barriers and devastations. Yet, our limited job protection creates complications in performing our work. Many of us have found ourselves in conflicted situations, where our level of responsibility exceeds our level of protection.
"I’m fighting to unionize advisers at UW so that we are valued commensurate with our education and skills"
I’ve worked at UW for nearly 8 years and seen so many of my colleagues get frustrated at how undervalued, overworked, and uncompensated we are. I’d love to make a career out of working at UW, but starting a family in the greater Seattle area is extremely difficult with the current state of our roles. I’m fighting to unionize advisers at UW so that we are valued commensurate with our education and skills, and to ultimately build career professionals in higher education that can support both students and their lives outside of work.
"By joining together & unionizing (...) we would have a long-term solution to support all of our work for students!"
There are so many cases of advisers from different departments having different access levels to resources, training, and support. UW Seattle is so siloed that there is no consistency across departments or divisions. There is this constant game of telephone happening amongst the advisers for how people got certain resources or support and ways to help each other get the same. Advisers as a collective have such an incredible impact on students and by joining together & unionizing that game of telephone can stop because we would have a long-term solution to support all of our work for students!
"Through collectivity, we can affect the change we would like to see."
As a University of Washington Alumna and now a Professional Staff member, my commitment to furthering diversity, equity, and inclusion has been a throughline throughout both my student and staff experience. It is only through the amplification of marginalized voices within our UW community, that we can effectively advance access, opportunity, and justice for all. Professional Staff are integral to carrying out the University's mission. Students, staff, and faculty benefit from a campus climate that not only speaks of the importance of diversity, but reflects it demographically. Through collectivity, we can affect the change we would like to see. "We cannot walk alone." -Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
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More about our union
A Union is a group of workers who have come together to make systemic changes! We are organizing for a Union Election in order to win the legal right to negotiate as a group with our employer over mandatory subjects of bargaining: wages, benefits, and working conditions. The result of negotiations is a legally binding Collective Bargaining Agreement that must be followed – and provides a process for recourse if it is not. Uniting together gives us far more power and protection than when we try to address our employer as individuals.
Yes! Washington State law gives professional staff at the UW the legal right to unionize.
In fact, since 2020, professional staff at the UW Institute for Health and Evaluation Metrics, as well as professional staff and supervising staff at the UW Libraries and Press successfully unionized! Check out their Collective Bargaining Agreements to see how they used their collective voices to bargain for fair-pay, professional development, equity, and anti-racism.
Because we are stronger together! More than 7,000 of our classified staff, professional staff, and academic staff colleagues at the UW are members of SEIU 925. And now we’re joining them!
SEIU Local 925 is the largest and most powerful union representing workers at the UW. Members of SEIU 925 include more than 7,000 classified staff and hundreds of professional and academic staff at the UW. By joining together with thousands of our colleagues and unionizing with SEIU 925, we will be well positioned to win the kinds of improvements we need for all of our Advising colleagues. It makes sense to join this effective, diverse union.
We are organizing to improve workplace conditions and address a wide range of workplace concerns. These concerns include, but are not limited to:
- inadequate training for new advisers;
- work/life imbalance;
- unclear or nonexistent career pathways;
- constant expansion of job duties;
- inconsistent job titles, supervision, and compensation;
- inequitable access to professional development;
- insufficient efforts to prevent or intervene in workplace harassment and discrimination;
- frequent turnover, especially in response to inconsistent and inflexible departmental solutions to and/or limited options for hybrid work schedules;
- inconsistent messaging from administration throughout the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated existing concerns about unsafe working conditions and the return on-campus/in-person Advising;
- consolidation of Advising units without input from Advisers;
- concern that advocating for our students and ourselves may put our jobs at risk;
- and the lack of an effective way for our input to impact UW policy and practice.
We recognize and deeply appreciate the efforts many of our colleagues have taken through other avenues (such as through the Community of Professional Advisors, Adviser Advocacy Group, Association of Professional Advisers and Counselors, Graduate and Professional Advisors Association, and Adviser Education Program), but we believe that only by forming our Union and obtaining the legal right to Bargain, professional Advising staff will have a true seat in decision-making at the UW.
Many of us are organizing BECAUSE we love our job! By working together, we believe that we can push the UW to be an employer that lives its mission and sets the standard not just for research, but also for the Advising profession. We are organizing because we recognize that the UW will become a top tier employer when fair pay is offered to all, professional development and pathways for promotion are accessible to all, workloads are sustainably allocated for all, and when equity is felt by all.
"Every Adviser, Every Campus, One Union!" means that our ability to advocate for our students and for our selves improves with each Adviser voice! Our supervisors and managers are not the primary impetus for organizing. Many of us have supervisors whom we respect and admire and who would make the changes we need if they had the power. In fact, by organizing, bargaining for better working conditions and pay, and clarifying and standardizing workplace rules and policies, we improve the workplace for all--including supervisors who try to advocate for their direct reports. When we bargain our first contract, we will be bargaining with UW Labor Relations and UW senior administrators, not our immediate supervisors.
We invite you to check out our Organizing Toolkit for more info about how to form a Union!
First, a group of coworkers (the Organizing Committee) takes responsibility for informing fellow employees and building majority support for the union. Our colleagues express their support by signing a membership card. Once a sufficient number of our coworkers have signed membership cards, we will file a petition for union recognition with the Public Employment Relations Commission (PERC). From that point, there are two potential routes to recognition: (1) a secret ballot election where we would need a simple majority of votes cast in order to win our union; or, (2) a process known as “card check.” With card check, if a majority of our potential union members join, PERC will recognize our union without the need for an election.
On Friday, June 28, 2024, we filed for a secret ballot Union Election!
Once we have won our union, through either card check or an election, it will be time to start negotiating our first contract. We will survey everyone in our union to determine our priorities, elect a bargaining team, and begin learning how to draft proposals for contract language. Experienced union staff will work with us at every step of the process, but only the members of our union will determine what we bargain over, and only we can decide whether or not to accept the contract.
You can also check out an overview of the organizing process in our Road Map to Forming A Union and Road Map to Winning a First Contract flyers.
We are "Every Adviser, Every Campus, One Union!" Our union will include all student-facing professional advising staff at the UW–academic advisers, admissions advisers, career counselors, and financial aid advisers–up to and including the “first level” of supervision. Any professional staff who do advising work, regardless of UW campus, job title, or FTE, will be included in our bargaining units, including people with split appointments.
For our Union, we are defining Advising work as student facing professionals who advise students and prospective students on financial aid and funding for education, enrollment and admissions, academics and courses, career paths, and professional development; excluding confidential employees and employees of the Office of the Registrar.
Limited-term and Project appointments involving bargaining unit work are handled differently. An employee who has a Limited-term appointment becomes eligible to join the union when they have worked 350 hours in a year. An employee who has a Project appointment is eligible the entire time of their appointment.
Professional advising staff who do not supervise other professional advising staff are eligible to organize together into one bargaining unit. In addition, the “first level” of professional staff advisers who supervise other professional staff advisers are also eligible to organize together in a separate bargaining unit. (See RCW 41.56.021 for exceptions.)
Dues are 1.7% of gross salary, so the exact amount depends on your compensation. Dues deduction begins after we have won our Union Election, Bargained our first contract, and then finally voted YES as a Union to accept it. It is unlikely that any of us would vote for a contract that does not make paying dues worthwhile.
The labor movement has long struggled to uplift the importance of race and equity in its organizing, though there have always been strands of unions that have focused on equity work. Many unions have an unfortunate history of focusing on the needs of white men. SEIU, however, has a strong history of focusing on race and equity. From its founding in 1921 by immigrant janitors, Black workers were voting members and writers of the union bylaws. Another reason SEIU has long been a union for BIPOC workers is because of its membership – services workers often identify as BIPOC. Recent examples of SEIU’s national and local work for racial equity include supporting Black Lives Matter, passing a resolution on the Movement for Black Lives, and voting in favor of expelling the Seattle Police Officers Guild from the local MLK Labor Council. In 2017, the SEIU Racial Justice Center was created as “a hub and resource for our work to create a world where everyone, no matter the color of their skin, can participate, prosper and reach their full potential.”
Even though race and equity are pillars of the work of SEIU, there is still work to be done. SEIU union members have the opportunity to join this work through groups such as embRACE, AFRAM, the BOLD Center, and local racial justice committees. We know that upholding racism is a key factor in keeping the working class divided. As the 2016 SEIU resolution 106A states, “in order to win economic justice, we must win racial justice.”
Additionally, SEIU has also been a champion of Women’s rights, Immigrant rights, and LGBTQ+ rights. Furthermore, both the SEIU 925 contract for UW classified staff and the 925 contract for professional staff at IHME include non-discrimination clauses as well as grievance procedures for addressing violations of the terms of the contract, including cases of discrimination and harassment.
Yes! We are building a Union of united professional staff and supervising staff who advise students. As a Union, we hope to transform the UW into a healthy work environment that fully includes the staff who make it run in its decision-making!
Per Washington State Law, we are building two bargaining units for our chapter: a non-supervisory unit and a supervisory unit. Our goal is to follow the structure of the SEIU 925 Libraries and Press Chapter by bargaining with UW Management as one big Union of united pro-staff and supervisory staff. In fact, our motto is "Every Adviser, Every Campus, One Union!"
Classified staff are in a completely separate bargaining unit from advisers, so if you only supervise classified staff, you will be part of our non-supervisory bargaining unit. If you are at the “first level” of supervision – meaning that you supervise other advisers, but none of them supervise anyone else – then you will be part of our supervisory bargaining unit. (See RCW 41.56.021 for exceptions.)
Supervisors have the added challenge of frequently being caught between UW Administration and other colleagues.
Although supervisors are responsible for ensuring that work gets done, they may have little authority to increase staffing, wages, or to set workload expectations or deadlines.
As a consequence, supervisors may end up working long hours in an attempt to make up for inadequate staffing and other gaps in organizational structures, contributing to burnout.
Many supervisors also find themselves taking on managerial roles without any explicit training or support for those roles.
By unionizing, supervisors will be able to bargain as a group to help shape the decisions that affect the ability of Advising Staff to support students, advocate for each other, and to improve our departments and programs.
Want more specifics about what supervisors can bargain in a Collective Bargaining Agreement? Check out our list of Mandatory Subjects of Bargaining.
Have questions about the rights of Supervisors during Union Organizing campaigns? Check out our flyer about your rights at work!
The goal is to bargain together over the many issues that we face in common. In fact, SEIU 925 Union Members have a long history of bargaining large and comprehensive Collective Bargaining Agreements (CBA) that cover many groups of different workers together. Here's a link to the UW Libraries and Press Chapter's Union Contract that we can use as inspiration when we are at the Bargaining Table.
When issues arise that are unique to one group or the other, we will be able to address those issues separately, either as clauses in our CBA, or as MOUs added after. Imagine a Venn diagram with a very large overlap in the middle and narrow crescents on the edges.
EVERY ADVISER, EVERY CAMPUS, ONE UNION means that our ability to advocate for our students, our work, and ourselves improves with each additional person who contributes their input and participation! If you belong to a unique program or department, then please be sure to participate in our Bargaining Surveys, Town Halls, and Building Meetings as a Union Member, or even join our future Bargaining Team so that the voice of your program is enshrined in our future CBA!
By signing our Membership card, you are saying that you want to be represented by SEIU 925, that you want to help form our union, and that you want to be a member of our union once we have won our Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA). You should treat this card as if it were your vote to form our union.
Our Union's strength increases with each new person who decides to publicly support our Union! Being public about your Union Membership, either by wearing a Union Button, putting a Union sign on your desk, or by adding your name to our Public Announcement, signals to your colleagues that you have their back when it comes to organizing for FAIR PAY, EQUITY, PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT, and PROMOTION PATHWAYS. It signals that you are not afraid to exercise your Constitutional right to have a Union, nor that anyone else should be afraid to do the same. It also signals to UW Administration that you are part of the growing majority of Advising Staff who believe that pro-staff should have the right to bargain over wages, benefits, and working conditions.
The choice to be public is your choice and your choice alone! Unless you explicitly say otherwise, signing your Union Membership card is treated by our Organizing Committee with full confidence. No one in Administration will ever see our Membership, nor will they be told who signed.
We hope that you will boldly, proudly, and publicly support our union! When we stand together and make our support for our Union visible, we show our colleagues – and UW Administration – that we are united in our campaign and committed to improving UW Advising through our collective voice.
Depending on your individual comfort level and relationship with your colleagues, you may want to inform eligible colleagues about our activities or invite them to get involved. However, this is entirely your choice, and we understand that we all need to make decisions that best fit our individual circumstances.
The decision to join our Union is confidential unless and until you choose to make your support public. It is neither legal nor appropriate for any supervisor or member of UW Administration to ask you anything about your support for or opinions about our organizing effort. If you are at all uncertain or uncomfortable, it’s always safe to respond, “I don't know.” And you can always follow up with a member of our Organizing Committee.
Get involved
It is time for advising staff to organize for fair and equitable employment conditions. Are you a supporter? We need a majority of us to show support to form our union!