Rutgers students walked into empty classrooms Monday morning as their professors demonstrated outside in what is the first teaching strike in the university's history.
Picket lines were set up across Rutgers’ three campuses in New Brunswick, Newark and Camden as hundreds of professors, adjunct faculty members and graduate workers — joined by alumni and undergraduate students — held signs demanding better wages.
Three faculty unions representing 9,000 members announced their plan to strike Sunday night after nearly a year of contract negotiations with university officials. The unions — which are putting particular emphasis on job security and compensation for part-time and non-tenured faculty – asked members to cancel classes and stop grading. It’s not clear how many of Rutgers’ 67,000 students were affected.
Gov. Phil Murphy convened a meeting at noon Monday between university administrators and union representatives in the hopes of reaching a fair deal. Dory Devlin, a spokeswoman for Rutgers President Jonathan Holloway, said the administration was encouraged by Murphy’s call for talks “and are hopeful that we can quickly come to a resolution of the remaining outstanding issues.”
But around Rutgers campuses, some classrooms sat empty as confused students wondered why classes were canceled.
“I'm all for these teachers. I hope they get paid,” freshman Richard Cuevas said. He was heading to the gym for the day after realizing his English class was empty and his professor...
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