In the mid 1968-1984 my Grandpa, Lorell Price, was a faculty members at the Penn State Berks Campus, where he taught history and political science. Throughout the 1970s, the faculty at the commonwealth campuses were in the process of trying to unionize to fight for better wages and benefits. Such efforts to unionize on college campuses had been a nationwide trend starting in the 1960s. By 1970, the Pennsylvania legislature passed a law that ensured the rights of employees at state-related institutions to collectively bargain, and massive Penn State had seen massive increases in enrollment, both of which encouraged the faculty at many of the commonwealth campuses to do the same. The success of faculty at other public institutions in the commonwealth such as Temple and many community colleges as well as Berks’ reputation for being a strong labor town gave the faculty at Berks confidence in their ability to organize a union and formed PSU-BRANCH to accomplish their goals.

However, in 1971, the Pennsylvania Labor Relations made a ruling that in order for a faculty union to be approved, it must be university-wide, meaning that it had to include faculty members from the University Park Campus. Faculty members therefore tried to expand their unionization efforts to every campus, but the vote to organize, while close, failed.

But that’s not the end of the story. In 1967, the maintenance staff, technical, and service workers had successfully organized under the Teamsters Union. As a result, these workers received better health benefits and wages. Seeing other University employees receive such benefits galvanized commonwealth campus faculty in their efforts to organize even more. The University, realizing this to be the case, thus increased faculty pay and improve benefits (including orthodontic care and healthcare) in order to ward off another union vote. Ultimately, while my Grandpa and his colleagues were not able to organize a union, they did achieve many of their goals; most notably, they received better benefits for themselves and their families.

In a similar vein, there has been efforts at Penn State to unionize graduate assistances for similar purposes. Likewise, this has resulted in graduate students receiving increased salaries and better benefits in an effort to stop unionization attempts. The same phenomena can be observed in fields besides higher education as well. For example, workers at foreign automobile manufacturing companies are often paid union rates to prevent them from organizing.

Ultimately, the moral of this story is that unions benefit every American, whether they are in one or not. Having the ability to push for unionization forces companies and institutions to be competitive with union wages and benefits; whenever unions provide benefits for their members, they in affect compel other businesses to follow suit. To put it in simple terms, the rising tide lifts all boats; improving working conditions, wages, and benefits for some can result in improvements for others. Protecting the right to petition and organize is personal for me and my family because it allowed my Grandpa to receive the benefits and pay he deserved.

Read more about the efforts of the Penn State Commonwealth Campuses to unionize in the 1970s here.

Read about the efforts of graduate students at Penn State to unionize here.