USF graduate assistant union disputes denial of 2026-2027 pay raise

Florida aims to have 60% of working-age adults hold post-secondary degrees by 2030, but the state's largest public university is currently in a dispute over how it compensates the graduate students who support that mission.

The University of South Florida denied requests for wage increases and stipend negotiations from its Graduate Assistants Union last week. Union president Tessa Barber said the university wants to delay pay talks until next summer, a timeline she described as a departure from the understanding reached in their last contract.

Barber stated that the union signed an agreement last year with the expectation that they would negotiate pay for the 2026-2027 academic year later in the process. When negotiations began this month, the university’s bargaining team indicated that the Board of Trustees had not authorized any increases. Instead, the union was told to wait for the final budget, which may not be set until July.

The union argues that graduate assistants are essential to the university's operations. Barber noted that more than a quarter of classes at USF are taught by graduate students and that their research generates hundreds of millions of dollars. She said that despite this contribution, pay has remained stagnant while housing, food, and gas prices have risen.

“Housing prices are going up, costs of living are going up, food prices, gas prices,” Barber said. “But our pay has remained stagnant. It hasn't even kept up with inflation. So graduate assistants are experiencing food and housing insecurity.”

Graduate assistants are generally required to work at least 40 hours per week on learning and teaching duties. Many also hold jobs in the service industry to make ends meet, a practice the university has recently begun to restrict. Barber said this crackdown makes it harder for assistants to work outside the university without fear of losing their positions.

USF President Moez Limayem told students at a town hall this year that stipends are not high enough but noted that graduate assistants are not supposed to live on them alone. The union, which formed in 1980, faces additional challenges from state law SB 1296. This legislation requires half of a workforce to vote in a union election for it to be valid, a threshold a legislative staff analysis suggests could conflict with the state Constitution. The next public bargaining session is scheduled for November 13 at 10 a.m. on the USF campus.