As of today — July 1, 2026 — the 2023 agreement between Brown and the Graduate Labor Organization (GLO), which represents graduate students employed in teaching and research positions at Brown, has expired. While all parties have worked in good faith since February to bargain toward a new contract, including a final session yesterday before the contract expiration, we remain far apart on important issues. With no new agreement in place and the prior contract now expired, we write with information on negotiations and next steps.

It is important to start by making clear that we greatly value our graduate students — both those in employment roles and those who are not — and the contributions they make to our research and teaching enterprise. As part of our commitment to sustaining a community where every member can thrive, Brown has made substantial investments in support for graduate students over the last decade, as detailed in this message. This expansion in support provides important context for the current negotiations. The investments we have made ensure that students are well supported to earn a graduate degree from one of the top research universities in the world.

Given the challenges that unresolved labor negotiations can at times create, it is important that the Brown community has a clear understanding of the University's approach to bargaining. We know too that the absence of a new agreement may prompt questions about the continuity of key aspects of academic life at Brown, particularly as we look toward the fall semester. In this update, we address questions that some may have about the negotiations and what the next steps might look like as we continue to bargain toward a fair agreement.

Financial Support for Brown’s Doctoral Students

For years, Brown has been committed to providing doctoral students with generous stipends, comprehensive healthcare and support measures that extend to spouses, children and parental responsibilities, with the goal of enabling students to focus full time on their academic progress and training. After significant increases throughout the last decade, the stipend and benefit support we provided our graduate students in 2025-26 exceeded that of nearly every college and university in the United States, including our peer institutions in the Ivy Plus (which typically includes the Ivy League, plus a small number of highly selective private research universities).

At $52,198, our base stipend is the highest in the Ivy Plus, with the exception of Stanford in Palo Alto, California, where the cost of living is demonstrably higher, and one or two specific programs at other schools with stipends that exceed their base rate. Between Fiscal Year 2018 and Fiscal Year 2026 at Brown, stipends increased 78% for students in the humanities and social sciences and 57% in the sciences. In addition to the base stipend, Brown’s benefits to Ph.D. and MFA students for the 2026-27 year will include: 

• Full tuition scholarship ($74,568)
• A first-year supplemental transitional  payment for incoming students ($1,750)
• A cost of healthcare assistance payment ($1,250)
• Full coverage of health insurance premium ($5,283) and dependents
• Full coverage of dental insurance premium ($291) and dependents
• Full coverage of student vision insurance premium ($117)
• Parental support including a childcare subsidy of $6,000 per child per year up to age 6 and up to $3000 per child per year from ages 7-13
• Parental relief, which provides a full semester where academic and service-based expectations are paused but funding remains, up to two times during their tenure as a Brown student
• Backup care for children
• Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) and University Health Services access
• Graduate School incentive supplements for doctoral students in the humanities and social sciences with external fellowship awards
• Travel and research funding
• Emergency funding
• International student visa and legal assistance fund 

Bargaining between the University and union on economic terms has taken place within the context of these substantial investments from Brown over the last decade, which have established the support provided to our graduate students as unmatched by nearly any other institution. Among our goals in the current negotiations is to maintain Brown’s leadership position responsibly for current students and future cohorts, in a way that also considers equity across the larger set of employee and student groups on campus. At a time when federal actions and other factors have led to negative financial impacts, we have worked to carefully manage growth in salaries, wages and benefits (which account for the largest share of Brown’s expenses), and it is important to us that any changes to graduate student stipends and benefits are consistent with our decision-making around financial support for other groups on campus.

The union’s first proposal included base stipend increases of 12%, 11% and 10% over three years (a 36.8% total compounded increase), significant expansions on childcare subsidy benefits, doubling of the first-year supplemental fellowship and inclusion of graduate students in Brown’s employee retirement plans, among other economic terms. Such increases would vastly exceed salary increases for all other employee groups at the University, including in the 10 other bargaining units on campus. The University responded with a proposed total stipend increase of 6.7% over five years, with increases introduced in increments over those years. Our offer also included measured increases for other types of support offered to students, including a $20,000 increase in an assistance fund to support bargaining unit members who are international students. We feel our counterproposal represents a fair offer in light of equity with other employee groups, comparison to peer institutions, Brown’s fiscal constraints and Brown’s record investments in graduate education over the past 10 years. While it remains on the table, we have made little progress on economic terms in recent bargaining sessions. 

Students on Fellowship Appointments

Beyond economic terms, an additional point of disagreement that is important to clarify is an effort by GLO to expand the union by including graduate students who are funded through fellowships.

First, some background: Since 2018, when the University and the union agreed on terms for an election to determine whether or not eligible graduate students wished to move forward with union representation, eligible members of the bargaining unit have been graduate students who serve as research assistants (RAs), teaching assistants (TAs), Teaching Fellows (TF) or proctors. These are students actively providing research and instructional services to the University in exchange for their funding, and they therefore qualify as compensated employees. Given their standing as employees, Brown recognized the union after the students’ vote, and worked collegially and productively with union leaders toward the first contract in 2020 and a second in 2023.

Students on fellowship appointments, on the other hand, do not serve as RAs, TAs, TFs or proctors and are not required to perform services to Brown in exchange for their funding. Most fellows are (1) first-year Ph.D. students enrolled in a full course load; (2) Ph.D. candidates who have fulfilled all degree requirements, including teaching obligations, and are focused exclusively on completing their dissertation; or (3) Ph.D. students who have secured independent funding to support specific research goals and are completing Brown’s academic requirements and other obligations per the terms of their external award. In each of these cases, students receive Brown funding exclusively in support of their academic work, with no exchange of services performed for the University, and they therefore do not meet the common law definition of employees. For these reasons, the University declined to grant voluntary recognition to students on fellowship when GLO requested this. It is also worth noting that the existing contract with GLO guarantees that the stipend amounts for these students remain the same as those for students in bargaining unit positions, meaning there is no practical difference in Brown funding provided.

Because students on fellowship do not provide services to Brown and are not employees, we will continue to maintain our position in accord with the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), the governing legal framework. Brown has a long and productive history of working in good faith with employees who are eligible to unionize and elect to do so. Currently, 11 bargaining units on campus represent employees in a wide variety of roles, including the graduate students serving as TAs, RAs, TFs and proctors who are represented by GLO. In the case of students on fellowship, they are not performing services to Brown and are therefore not eligible employees.

Finding a Path Forward

With the understanding that we would likely encounter a number of points to work through in sessions, the University had originally invited GLO representatives to begin bargaining in Summer 2025, but the union declined. With no contract in place as of today, all provisions on wages, hours, benefits and working conditions for graduate students in these positions will remain in effect as outlined in the expired agreement, per law. 

Even as we continue to navigate discussions on economic terms and other points of disagreement, we have made progress on other topics. We have held formal bargaining sessions, sidebar conversations on particular topics and discussions in which GLO leaders had the chance to meet with representatives from key departments on campus, such as the International Student and Scholar Services team. This month, we reached tentative agreement on a number of contract articles, and the University and union agreed to meet throughout the summer with the goal of continued progress.

We remain committed to continued dialogue with union leaders and to ongoing bargaining in good faith toward a new agreement with GLO. We will continue to provide updates as needed, especially as we approach the start of the fall semester.

Sincerely,

Francis J. Doyle III, Provost

Sarah C. Latham, Executive Vice President for Finance and Administration