Faculty from the department of religious studies released a statement last Tuesday in support of the Duke Graduate Students Union, recognizing the “right of Duke graduate students to form an employer-recognized union.”
“We will not penalize graduate students in any way for engaging in unionizing efforts nor will we endorse any disciplinary measures directed at graduate students who have participated in such efforts or against those who have not,” the statement read.
The statement also endorsed “free discussion” and urged students and university leaders to “engage in a constructive dialogue.”
The department of religious studies is the third department to publicly announce support for the union, with the history department faculty and faculty from the department of cultural anthropology releasing nearly identical statements in April.
"The department was unanimous in wishing to put out a statement, and we were inspired by the departments of History and Cultural Anthropology. We appreciated the way that those departments had worded their statements, so I reached out to them to get their permission to use the same wording, and they were more than happy to agree," wrote Mark Goodacre, professor of religious studies and former department chair, in an email to The Chronicle.
Clay Capra, secretary of the History Graduate Student Association, DGSU co-representative and a first-year doctoral student in the history department, previously told The Chronicle that he hoped the publication of their statement would result in a “snowball effect” for other departments to show their support for the DGSU.
The National Labor Relations Board approved the DGSU’s petition for a union election in July, rejecting Duke’s efforts to challenge a 2016 NLRB case that classified doctoral students as employees with a right to unionize. Ballots for the union election will be counted Tuesday.
This story was updated Tuesday afternoon to include Goodacre's email.
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Kerria Weaver is a second-year master’s student in the Graduate Liberal Studies program and an associate news editor of The Chronicle’s 119th volume.