Power Imbalance Is Recurring Issue.

• Date: 01 August 2021
• Author: Levin, Annie

For the graduate student union organizers I spoke with at five different universities, both public and private, one item that came up over and over again, sometimes even before bread-and-butter issues like wages and health care, is abuse from authority figures. The hierarchical apprenticeship model of graduate education, with its focus on the relationship between adviser and advisee, can create a deeply toxic environment for the student when that relationship sours.

Advisers, especially when they bring profit into the university, can have immense power over their graduate workers. In the sciences, students work together closely in labs with professors who bring in money to the university through grants.

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