Union representatives said they knew of no Harvard Academic Workers-United Auto Workers members in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Harvard Medical School, or Harvard Divinity School who received the raises awarded to non-union employees.

At the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering, employees represented by HAW-UAW were informed by the institute’s human resources department that they would not receive the annual performance bonus or the July 1 salary increase, according to an email obtained by The Crimson.

The charge, submitted on behalf of HLS clinicians in the smaller of two bargaining units within HAW-UAW, accuses Harvard of unilaterally changing established wage practices more than two years into negotiations for an initial contract.

“Our unit has really strived to engage in an interest-based negotiation process and to avoid an adversarial approach,” said Anna Crowe, a member of the HAW-UAW law school bargaining committee and associate director of the International Human Rights Clinic.

“It was a really heavy and serious decision for us to move forward with filing the unfair labor practice charges,” she added.

The charge alleges that Harvard violated sections 8(a)(5) and 8(a)(3) of the National Labor Relations Act by changing a mandatory subject of bargaining — wages in this case — without negotiation and discriminating in employees’ terms and conditions of employment to discourage union membership.

Harvard denied the allegation. Harvard spokesperson Jason A. Newton wrote in a statement that the union’s claim that Harvard committed an unfair labor practice by not implementing raises and bonuses without an agreement is “without merit and not consistent with the collective bargaining process.”

Newton added that Harvard has been “actively engaged in good faith bargaining” over compensation with both HAW-UAW units and remains committed to pay increases for all represented employees as part of a multiyear contract.

Harvard has proposed a four-year wage scheme that would guarantee annual raises, including at least a 7 percent raise in total compensation for HLS clinicians in the first year alone and a roughly 20 percent pay increase for much of the union over four years.

But the union said the proposal would lag behind inflation and leave clinical instructors’ salaries below national averages. In a HAW-UAW press release, Crowe called the suspension of raises and bonuses as a “blatant attempt to try to force our members to accept inadequate contract terms.”

Pay disparities between clinicians at Harvard and their counterparts at peer institutions were a major reason the group unionized, according to Mason Kortz, a union organizer and assistant director of the Cyberlaw Clinic.

“By withholding pay increases this year, the law school is widening that gap,” he said, “making the union’s task even harder and sending a clear message that our contributions to the school are not valued as they should be.”

The HLS charge argues that clinical instructors had customarily received the same raises and bonuses as non-union staff. Crowe said the alleged change was Harvard’s decision to stop extending those increases to represented workers.

To prevent unilateral decisions that could undermine the bargaining process, employers are required under the NLRA to maintain status quo terms of employment while a contract is under negotiation. But the central dispute between the union and Harvard is whether Harvard’s history of awarding annual raises established a status quo the University was required to continue.

“You have to look at all the facts,” said Risa L. Lieberwitz, a professor of labor and employment law at Cornell University. “Is there a pattern that was established, and if it was interrupted, did that change the nature of the status quo?”

Harvard has argued that maintaining the status quo means keeping wages constant until compensation is settled in bargaining. A Wyss Institute human resources representative told Flores via email that Harvard “may not unilaterally change the salary of or provide bonuses to employees represented by HAW outside of the bargaining process.”

The union points to Harvard’s actions in 2024. Status quo protections take effect as soon as a union files for a certification election with the National Labor Relations Board. For HAW-UAW, the union argues, this means Harvard must uphold the terms of employment in place when HAW-UAW filed for an election in March 2024.

Harvard continued giving HAW-UAW-represented workers raises in the summer of 2024 — just as it had done in summer 2023.

Union leaders said annual increases remained the norm despite freezes in 2020, during the Covid-19 pandemic, and in 2025, amid University-wide financial uncertainty.

But Lieberwitz said the varying percentages would not necessarily prevent the annual increases from constituting an established pattern.

“I still think there can be a pattern,” Lieberwitz said, “if it’s annual and people expected it at a certain time.”

At the Wyss Institute, employees had historically received performance bonuses at the end of each fiscal year. Manuel Francis Martinez Flores, a Wyss Institute staff engineer represented by HAW-UAW, said he expected the payment and described the institute’s initial communication of the decision as sparse and “very sneaky.”

Given said the larger HAW-UAW unit, which has not filed a charge, has told Harvard it is exploring possible action.

“We’ve let the administration know that we’re exploring our options on that front,” he said. “It’s a bit more complicated for us just because of the size and diversity of the unit.”

—Staff writer Noah A. Ferris can be reached at noah.ferris@thecrimson.com. Follow him on X @noahaferris.

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