Controversies
The GSOC strike has caused various disruptions across campus, including canceled classes, classes moved to off-campus locations, class boycotts, and protests inside Bobst Library . Sympathy for the GSOC strike also kept some speakers and recruiters from participating in campus events.
Several actions taken by the Sexton administration during the strike have sparked strong opposition among many faculty, students, and observers, including some who are not supportive of GSOC. Others, including some administrators, parents, undergraduates, have said that GSOC's strike is an unnecessary disruption to the academic process.
Soon after the strike began, several NYU administrators discreetly signed on as instructors to the Blackboard course management systems for courses with teaching assistants in order to monitor the impact of the strike. When the professors teaching these classes discovered this, a strong reaction among faculty against this perceived violation of academic freedom forced a reversal of the move.
In November 2005, NYU announced that graduate assistants who remained on strike past the fall 2005 semester would be locked out of working and receiving their stipends for one or two semesters. The university promised to fully fund tuition and healthcare, regardless of an individual GA's decision on whether to strike.
In January 2006, Sexton followed through with the measures, revoking the stipends of 23 striking graduate students for two semesters. However, in late February 2006, 15 of the 23 punished GAs received letters stating that their fall stipends would be restored. Grievances filed by these blacklisted GAs through the university's new non-union "interim" grievance procedure in early 2006 remained unadressed as late as December 23, 2006.
Read more about this topic: Graduate Student Organizing Committee