Admin “Response” to our Petition, COVID Safety Calls to Action
Table of Contents:
Announcements:
Events:
ANNOUNCEMENTS
Chancellor and Provost “Respond” to GEO Petition
COVID-19 cases on UIUC’s campus are higher than they have ever been. As of 1/26/22, the positivity rate on campus was 5.47%, with a 4.12% 7-day positivity rate. In just three days since our last update, the positivity rate has jumped 2% with no reduction in sight. In the month of January so far (1/2/22-1/26/22), there have already been 3,621 positive cases on campus. In comparison, there were 1,883 positive cases for the entire semester of Fall 2021, 1,660 in Spring 2021, and 4,382 in Fall 2020. In Champaign County, the 7-day positivity rate is 19.4%, up from 12.5% less than a week ago. As a result, GEO, other campus labor unions, and over 1,275 community members called on UIUC to implement reasonable safety measures like an exposure notification system, increased testing requirements, n-95 quality masks, and worker choice about instructional modality.
Nonetheless, Chancellor Jones and Provost Cangellaris assert that campus is “one of the safest environments in our county if not the entire state.” Their response parroted their PR campaigns and was of little substance, but to better understand what we are dealing with, we encourage you to read their entire response here.
Safety Email Call to Action
Chancellor Jones and Provost Cangellaris’s response to our petition was unacceptable and their irresponsible handling of the pandemic puts the entire community at risk. The GEO is calling on all graduate workers, students, faculty, staff, and concerned community members to email the chancellor and provost and let them know we demand more robust protections.
Find a template for your email here. This is a solid starting point, but feel free to add to it with your experiences or feelings about the way UIUC has handled COVID and the omicron variant in particular. It is clear they will not keep us safe. All of us taking action gives us a chance.
GEO COVID-19 Safety Lesson Plan: Slides, Zoom Backgrounds & Graphics
The high rates of COVID-19 continue to put our campus and community at serious risk of debilitating illness, long COVID, and death, disproportionately impacting our disabled, immunocompromised, and older community members. Yet we are expected to work and learn with no exposure notifications, no widespread required testing, rare building access checks, and only 1 medical-grade mask per community member. Our working conditions are students’ learning conditions: if TAs and our students get sick, students’ quality of education will suffer.
We need your help to demand safer working and learning conditions from UIUC.
Use/adapt COVID-19 Lesson Plan slides (developed by GEO TAs) to talk to your students about COVID-19 policy in the classroom and their needs and concerns.
Use our COVID-19 safety Zoom backgrounds (designed by GEO members) in meetings, classes, and other online events
Share GEO’s petition (tinyurl.com/UIUCSafetyPetition) and graphics on social media with #ILLatIllinois #WeKeepUsSafe #OurLearningOurLaborOurChoice
All of these materials can be found at https://bit.ly/GEOCOVIDRESOURC
EVENTS
Virtual Welcome Session - 1/31, 12-1 PM and 6-7 PM
Interested in better healthcare and a living wage? GEO invites ALL graduate students (invite your non-GEO friends!) to learn about their rights and the conditions set by contract around wages, tuition waivers, fees, workload, health care, child care, immigration, and more. We will spend 30 minutes outlining the importance of getting involved and how we can fight to earn better benefits, with remaining time left for questions. Join here for a virtual session taking place on Monday, January 31 from 12-1pm or 6-7pm. Email geo@uigeo.org with questions.
GEO Virtual Game Night - 1/29, 4-5 PM
Join us for virtual fun and games! We can play board games, card games, word games, drawing games, and party games, all based on the preferences of attendees. All are welcome, even if you’re not a GEO member yet, so invite your friends! meet.google.com/jdg-sfhe-hwr
[Image description: Colorful board game squares and white board game pieces border yellow and white words on a black background. The words read: Stewards' Council Presents GEO Virtual Game Night
Join us for word games, card games, board games, party games, and more! Saturday, January 29th, 4-5pm
In Solidarity,
Graduate Employees’ Organization
809 S. 5th St., Geneva Room
Champaign, IL 61820
Email: geo@uigeo.org