Author Archives: Stephanie Seawell

History Matters: A Look Back at the Champaign County Labor Movement of the 1920s

For the past two years, newspaper headlines across Illinois have carried grim reports of budget impasse and inadequate funding for core state services and institutions, including for our flagship University in Urbana-Champaign.  Unfortunately, such dire reports are nothing new. “University’s … Continue reading

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History Matters: Compromising How We Teach Slavery

If you checked your Facebook feed early in October, there is a good chance you saw a news story about a textbook controversy in Texas. In case you missed it, here is what happened. A ninth grader opened his World … Continue reading

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Privatization Comes to the Postal Service, Protest Comes to Champaign-Urbana

For the past few years you may have seen headlines about threats to close post offices and reductions in postal service and delivery hours. Now, the Post Office faces another threat—privatization. Over the past several months the US Postal Service … Continue reading

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One of The Core Union Values is Solidarity!

Recently the Graduate Employees Organization (GEO), the union for graduate student teaching assistants and research assistants at the University of Illinois, made a few changes to the union’s organizational structure. More specifically, the GEO added an elected Solidarity Officer to … Continue reading

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Tuition Waivers Protected for Graduate Students

On December 4th, the members of the Graduate Employees Organization (GEO) at the Urbana-Champaign campus of the University of Illinois approved a new contract with the administration of the University that will maintain and protect tuition waivers for the next … Continue reading

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Photos of GEO’s “Let Us Work” Rally

On November 8, a “Let Us Work: Work With Us” rally was held by the GEO on the plaza of the Undergraduate Library.                        

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Campus Support Grows for GEO’s Efforts to Protect Public Education

The Graduate Employees Organization (GEO) at the University of Illinois is in the midst of an important fight to protect access to public higher-education. On campus support has been growing for the GEO in this struggle. The GEO represents about … Continue reading

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Graduate Employee Tuition Waivers, Protecting Public Education, and Boxed Coffee

      As I write this, the Graduate Employees Organization, or GEO, at the University of Illinois is engaged in an effort to protect access to quality public higher education here in Champaign-Urbana. The GEO is a union that … Continue reading

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