LABOR SPRING 2024:
A Call to Action for Work and Democracy!

What is Labor Spring? 

Labor Spring is a nationally coordinated day of labor education and student and workers' rights awareness raising. The first Labor Spring was launched by the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor at Washington DC's Georgetown University, and ever since, Labor Spring at Wayne State University has served as a day of labor and workers' rights education for the campus and surrounding community. The event is free and open to the public. All are welcome.

Working people are powering the largest upsurge in intersectional class activism in a generation. Autoworkers, nurses, student assistants, delivery workers, actors, screenwriters, baristas, hotel, casino, and retail workers and others are uniting in a multi-racial effort to demand justice on the job and to defend our democracy. This comes at a time when politics, the economy, technology, and work are rapidly shifting. What does this mean for workers and students? Come be part of the discussion at Wayne State University’s second annual Labor Spring Teach-In!

Wednesday, March 20th: Panel Sessions
WSU Student Center, 2nd Floor - Hilberry EF

12:00PM - 12:50PM: What Is a Union? How Do I Organize?

Crash course into union politics and labor activism: What are unions? What is their history? Why are they important? How do I join one? If I don’t have a union at work, how can I get one started safely? 

1:00PM - 1:50PM: What Rights are Workers’ Rights?

Ever have a boss tell you that you can’t discuss your pay at work? Did you know that’s illegal? What other rights do workers have on the clock that they might not know about, or are potentially being lied to about?

2:00PM - 2:50PM: Unions and Environmental Justice

We hear a lot in the news about how protecting the environment means we need to sacrifice jobs or the economy. Who benefits from making these kinds of claims and just how wrong are they? 

3:00PM - 4:00PM: Unions and Human Rights

Workers have rights off the clock, too! What about workers’ rights to housing, bodily autonomy, or freedom from discrimination and hatred? Learn how unions are strong allies in these struggles as well! 

Thursday, March 21st: Irving Bluestone Lectureship on Workplace Issues
Undergraduate Library, 2nd Floor - Community Room

4:00PM - 6:00PM: "Labor Spring: Higher Ed, Union Revival, and Labor History at a Crossroads," Dr. Joseph A. McCartin

Dr. Joseph A. McCartin joins Labor@Wayne, the Fraser Center for Workplace Issues, Higher Ed Labor United (HELU), and the Wayne State Department of History for its 2024 Irving Bluestone lecture. McCartin is the author of Collision Course: Ronald Reagan, the Air Traffic Controllers and the Strike that Changed America, Labor's Great War, and, more recently, of articles on public sector workers and Bargaining for the Common Good.  He serves as Executive Director the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor and Professor at Georgetown University.