LOS ANGELES — When 48,000 University of California academic workers went on strike in mid-November, Stacy Fahrenthold joined them on the picket line. The associate professor of history at UC Davis canceled lectures and will not read final papers or record grades until the walkout is settled.
“We don’t have the grading labor to do it,” said Fahrenthold, who would normally rely on a graduate student worker to score assignments.
Such disruption has unfolded throughout the UC system‘s 10 campuses. As the massive strike by teaching assistants, tutors, graduate student researchers and postdoctoral scholars drags into its fourth week, the walkout has reached a pivotal moment, exacting its harshest toll yet on students, faculty and picketers during the all-important finals week in California’s premier higher education system.
