Student organizers at Duke have been protesting the racialized abuse of campus workers. We appreciate those students for reminding us the ways power colors the relationships between universities and workers.
As college students, we often conceptualize our university as a triangle: administrators, faculty and students. Workers are oft-forgotten in this equation. Yet, the staff — housekeepers, parking attendants, dining hall employees, etc. — are invaluable in making universities function.
To be clear, we are not calling for valuing them only because of what they bring to the University, but rather because their humanity demands they be treated with respect and dignity, too.
We cannot ignore the racial and socio-economic demographic makeup of workers either. Many workers are low-income, people of color and immigrants. Universities leverage their low societal status as an opportunity to provide low wages and poor benefits.
Situations at Duke remind us of the disparity in power that exists even in such a localized community. We commend the organizers for advocating for a dismantling of that.
And the situation at Duke could happen here. UNC has been and continues to be complicit in dehumanizing workers by offering low wages and poor benefits and inhibiting their ability to advocate and organize for themselves.
Universities must ask themselves: Are we interested in cultivating a space in which we appreciate and empower the humanity of all of our communities — including workers — or will we sacrifice our ethics in supporting the university machine?
