Mass participation is the source of our power, and what we win in bargaining is a reflection of that power. To win big in the next round of bargaining, Union MADE is committed to building mass participation at every level of our workplace so that every worker has greater control over their working and living conditions.

Our Priorities:

• Ensure job and pay security despite state and federal funding cuts

• Protecting our 2022 gains from inflation and cost-of-living increases

• Pay equity across campuses and job titles

• Rights, protections, and dignity for international scholars

• Support for parents and caregivers

Our Plan to Win: Power and Unity through Mass Participation

• Participatory and democratic priority-setting, building on the bargaining survey and bargaining convention, and open bargaining

• Building confidence through collective action, up to and including a supermajority-participation strike if justified and necessary

• Coordinating with other UC unions bargaining this year (UPTE, CNA, AFT, AFSCME)

We are stronger together. Inspired by the power of our massive strike in 2022, we came together last fall to form UAW 4811, the largest local union at UC and in the UAW. But our work does not end here. To build industrial power capable of taking on UC, we must continue to organize across all campuses and job titles, and we must continue to organize the unorganized. We are committed to:

• Achieving supermajority membership in all units

• Lay the groundwork for a successful contract campaign for Postdocs and ARs in 2027 by merging units to increase collective power, and building a network of active leaders to increase membership and participation to project a credible strike threat

• Build a wall-to-wall union of workers at the UC by organizing new units including Student Services and Advising Professionals, Research and Public Service Professionals, LBL Researchers, and undergraduate student employees.

As a highly-organized union of 48,000 workers, we are critical leaders in the political fight for economic, racial, and social justice, especially during the Trump presidency. To defeat the Trump admin’s draconian policies and win real governing power for workers, we are committed:

• Fighting the right-wing attack on higher education, research funding, and the labor movement through mass action, coalition-building nationwide with unions and other progressive organizations, and strategic engagement with lawmakers

• Working with our political allies to defeat regressive policies and enact progressive ones like taxing the rich to fund higher education, establishing the right of undocumented students at UC to good union jobs, and expanding the right to organize

• Building our political organizing strength to play a major role in the 2026 midterm elections to elect pro-labor progressives and end the Republican majority in Congress

Members run this union. Worker leadership and union democracy are core values, and members of the Union MADE slate are committed to building and upholding democracy, mass participation, and transparency in our union. This means:

• Orienting every new worker to their union rights and welcoming them into UAW 4811

• Building membership so that every worker at UC has a voice in their union

• Updating our department OC and steward system to build capacity and improve department-level democracy

• Equipping workers to enforce their rights and build power, through regular, open organizing and contract-enforcement trainings

• Reforming our membership meetings to improve transparency and democracy and build community

In the face of an ongoing right-wing attack on the labor movement, now more than ever, it’s important that we fight to not only protect our right to organize, but expand the labor movement to improve working conditions for all working-class people, union and non-union. As the largest local in the UAW, we pledged to continue UAW 4811’s role as a leader in efforts to increase unionization in higher education and across other industries by:

• Continuing to support forming new unions at universities so we have a broad coalition of workers capable of resisting the Trump administration's assault on public research and higher education.

• Fighting alongside our UAW siblings in auto for a just transition away from fossil fuels that ensure new green jobs are high-paying, union jobs.

• Supporting unionization drives at every step of the EV supply chain, as we have done at Volkswagen in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

• Organizing unions in the many strategic industries in which UC graduates go on to work, including other higher ed institutions, tech, and medicine.

• Building on the reform efforts that achieved the historic One Member, One Vote and the election of President Shawn Fain.