Beloit College student workers hope to unionize, citing poor wages

BELOIT, Wis. (WTVO) — As winter slowly changes into spring, students at Beloit College are hoping to create some change of their own.

“We have about 435 student workers on campus. And the goal is to represent all of them,” said sophomore Jake Fein, who is part of Beloit Student Workers United, a committee seeking to unionize student workers, whom Fein says are significantly underpaid.

“The base pay for student workers on campus is $8.25 an hour,” Fein said. “That number is extremely low and speaks to a certain lack of respect that the administration has for the amount of labor students do on campus. We’ve also heard stories from students about lack of training, availability, lack of clear expectations.”

Junior Ela Heywood said she holds down three school-affiliated jobs and has decided to help push for unionizing to support her fellow workers.

“A lot of people rely on that as a source of income, whether it’s money that they send home to their families or it’s money that helps them with paying off their tuition. We want to be there for one another. And I think the union is a really great way of doing that,” she said.

Fein said efforts to unionize in recent years have been shut down by the college. Administrators, however, said they welcome discussions.

“We’re open to hearing about whatever issues the students want to talk about. So full range. So we’re excited to talk to them about how they see student work and how we can make student work more enriching and a better experience for them,” said Career and Professional Development Vice President Tim Leslie.

The committee will hold its first meeting on Friday.

“We’re hopeful. We’re trying to make our pitch that this is something that would be good for the college overall. But there’s no way of knowing until we sit down. And so we’re hopeful,” said xxxx