Our Strike Authorization Vote Has Begun!

NOTE! To vote, open the election buddy email you received. You may need to search for “ElectionBuddy” in your inbox.
If you cannot find it, see below or contact us.

On March 27th, 2026, we launched our strike authorization vote! Members in FAS, SEAS, HMS, and HDS are voting to decide whether to authorize our elected bargaining committee to call for a strike if needed. 

We had hoped it wouldn’t come to this. After bargaining for over 20 months, our bargaining team has tried to convince the Harvard administration to address the issues we are facing, yet they have refused. 

Now we are forced to take action! Too many of our coworkers have lost their jobs, too many have had their wages fall stagnant, too many feel unsafe at work, too many have had to make tough choices to make ends meet. 

Now is the time to act! A vote in favor of authorizing a strike is a big step, and we hope the administration will take this show of our collective power seriously. We have seen it work in other higher ed union negotiations, like the New York Universities (CFU-UAW), Weill Cornell Postdocs union (WCW-UAW) and UPenn (GET-UP-UAW).

Following a successful strike authorization vote, we will begin preparing for a strike in the event that the administration refuses to address our core concerns. 

If you have questions, please check out our strike frequently asked questions.

How to vote?

You will receive an email and text with your online secret ballot at your address registered with the union. Our vote will open Friday, March 27th at 7:00AM. Workers who have not yet signed a union authorization card may do so digitally here as part of the voting process. Eligible voters are non-tenure-track teachers and researchers in FAS, HMS, and HDS. You can see more information below.

Why vote?

By voting yes you are showing your support for your union and our contract demands. You are telling the Harvard administration that it needs to negotiate with us now, or else we will go on strike.

What are we trying to win?

We demand a contract that includes fair and reasonable policies that will protect our members and rightly value our contribution to the University.

How did we get to this point?

HAW’s contract negotiation process is slow because the Harvard Corporation makes it slow. We voted to unionize in April 2024! Since then, we delivered a majority petition, we had work-ins and rallies, our bargaining team of researchers and teaching faculty has worked tirelessly for almost two years, but Harvard’s bargaining team of lawyers and HR staff has been stalling, sometimes taking months to return articles with almost no changes.

The Harvard Corporation is making a choice not to give us a fair contract. Harvard is the richest university in the world. The endowment is $57B and growing. 2025 was a record breaking year in University donations. Other universities with smaller endowments and operating budgets have better policies for their workers. There is no reason Harvard cannot give us what we are asking for.

We have POWER!

The money and prestige Harvard has comes from our labor! We do the teaching that students pay tuition for; we do the research that brings in grant money and intellectual property rights; we generate prestige that brings in donations. Collective action has worked in many other universities and it will work at Harvard.

Other academic unions have won similar policies that Harvard is denying us. 

• Weill Cornell postdocs won 10-26% raises for Year 1 and 3% raises for every year after that. Wellesley non-tenure track faculty won 14.7% raises in Y1 and over 3% raises after that.
• At Weill Cornell and Mt. Sinai, postdocs cannot be laid off only due to loss of research funding. Instead, the employer must step in to cover their salaries. 
• Weill Cornell, Mt. Sinai, University of California, and UMass have a third-party grievance and arbitration process.
• At NYU, Contract Faculty voted for strike authorization in February 2026, and then went on strike for 2 days in March 2026, which resulted in a final tentative agreement with strong workload protections, significant increases for teaching faculty, and strong protections from harassment, discrimination and arbitrary terminations.
• NYU, Mt. Sinai and Weill Cornell have Union Security Agreements.
• No other unionized university has a time cap policy and it is a destructive practice, forcing out the best and most experienced educators.

Our contract and our Union will help to fight for the positive impact of higher ed in society and a healthy academic culture for all. We do the work of research and education that Harvard claims is its mission. Without our contract, we will lose entire teaching programs to the time caps policy. Without our contract, we are at risk of losing more researchers to funding uncertainty over the next several years. We are in a difficult time for higher ed, and the richest university in the world can and must take a leading position on supporting  research and keeping educational programs alive. Instead, Harvard is taking advantage of the incapacitated National Labor Relations Board to weaken worker power. Campus unions are our best way to make our employer, a rich and powerful institution, accountable to its workers, students, and society at large.acitated National Labor Relations Board to weaken worker power. Campus unions are our best way to make our employer, a rich and powerful institution, accountable to its workers, students, and society at large, rather than a handful of wealthy donors.