About 12,000 employees joined a union representing UC academic student employees, postdoctoral students and academic researchers May 19, making it the largest union in the UC.

The expansion brings United Auto Workers Local 4811 to 60,000 workers across the UC.

UAW Local 4811’s new union members include Student Services and Advising Professionals and Research and Public Service Professionals. SSAPs provide a variety of services to students and faculty, including curriculum planning, financial aid assistance and career service specialization. RPSPs engage in data collection, research and grant management.

SSAPs began negotiations for pay raises and other labor protections with the UC in July 2025, and RPSPs began negotiations in October of the same year. They solidified their first contracts with the UC in March, after threatening to strike if they did not reach an agreement.

[Related: United Auto Workers units finalize agreements with UC, avoid strike]

SSAPs and RPSPs have been working to join UAW Local 4811 since 2023, said Nandini Inmula, a member of local UAW Local 4811 and the co-chair of the SSAP-UAW bargaining team, in an emailed statement.

“We decided to request to join UAW 4811 to form a powerful, united force to improve all of our working lives here at UC,” she said in the statement.

Heather Hansen, a spokesperson for the UC Office of the President, said in an emailed statement that the Public Employment Relations Board is still reviewing the expansion.

The board is addressing questions concerning which bargaining unit these workers will be placed in and potential overlap between multiple unions, Hansen added in the statement.

Hansen said the UC seeks to maintain productive relationships with all employees, regardless of their union status.

“The University of California values the contributions of its technical and IT employees and remains committed to maintaining productive relationships with represented and non-represented employees alike,” Hansen said.

SSAPs and RPSPs are not IT workers.

Inmula, the assistant director of career services at the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs, said in the statement that the UC and UAW Local 4811 are both working to protect higher education amid the uncertainty of state and federal funding cuts. The SSAPs, RPSPs and UAW Local 4811 share many priorities, including protecting immigrant workers, research and healthcare funding and stable wages, she added.

“This decision to stand united as a local of 60,000 workers at UC allows us to make our voices that much louder together and work toward the mission of the UC,” Inmula said in the statement.