breaking news tonight in a massive show of support Rutgers University faculty have voted to strike with 94 percent in favor now the vote doesn't mean they'll walk off the job today but Union leadership now has the power to call a strike at any point negotiations between Rutgers and the two unions representing the school's 7 500 professors grad students and adjunct professors have failed and they've been working for eight months without a contract in response to the strike vote today Rutgers said in a statement no one wants to disrupt students academic progress and we're committed to working as hard as we possibly can to negotiate contracts with our unions that are fair reasonable and responsible we've already held more than 100 bargaining sessions and will continue to meet in good faith with them now if a strike is called it would be the first time in Rucker's 256-year history that Educators walk off the job joining me now is Rebecca given president of the Rutgers aauup aft Union and Minnesota associate professor at Rutgers School of Management and Labor Relations Rebecca thanks so much for being with us today now the The Faculty today voted to authorize a strike when and how will you decide to actually go on strike the leadership of our unions will decide depending on progress at the bargaining table we still want to bargain a contract without a strike and we hope that Rutgers Administration will be willing to do that but in the coming weeks our members are telling us that they're going to be out of patience and they're out of time what have you been asking for that the university has either denied or has responded in a way that you deem unsatisfactory our demands are really simple they're pretty basic we're not asking for the moon we're asking for equal pay for equal work for our adjunct faculty we're asking for a living wage for grad workers who perform essential labor at the University we're asking for fair treatment of our students and their housing costs and not being sent to collections for unpaid bills we're really asking for basic fairness and a better record for all of us and we hope that the administration will see that we're trying to create a place that works for everybody where and how have these negotiations really fallen through is there a key sticking point honestly we're still waiting for responses on some of our proposals that we put across the table nine or ten months ago so um the progress has been has been painfully slow and we want to move forward we want to settle a contract were you surprised today by the turnout by the percentage of Faculty that voted yes to authorize the strike um I was not so much surprised as inspired I think uh what our members are willing to do to build a better Rutgers is is really amazing and I I feel inspired I feel moved and I feel ready to make a better records we're here because we love Rutgers we love our students we love the work that we do and uh we want it to work for all of us now there has never actually been a strike where faculty and staff have walked out on the job but a strike was authorized just in 2019. tell us what happened there and whether or not you think that indicates whether this authorization to strike might be a success yeah last uh last contract round in 2019 we came within a few hours of going on strike but we were able to settle a contract and we will of course try to settle a contract this time around as well without a strike but our members have told us loud and clear that they're not willing to wait forever and so it's really the ball is in Rutgers administration's court it's up to them if they want to bargain seriously take our proposal seriously and work with us to make the university the place it can be we are happy to do that how different are the demands that you're making Now versus 2019 do you think that you will be able to resolve this successfully I think we're making demands that are fair and reasonable but that require Rutgers to be a leader and to set forth a vision for example in not exploiting adjuncts but in making sure that adjunct faculty are paid equally with others doing the same work so our demands may be ambitious but we think records can lead with us and can and can set a new standard Rebecca given thank you so much for your perspective thanks for having me [Music]