Quick Actions

Send an email letter.

Take 2 minutes to send an email letter to the USM Board of Regents, university presidents, and our elected officials. A sample letter is provided that you can edit. Please encourage everyone you know to send a letter!

Send A Letter

Link to share: https://actionnetwork.org/letters/usm-raises 

Generate online pressure.

The best thing to do is to write your own post sharing how disappointed you are in the layoffs of hard-working AFSCME members and how these layoffs will negatively impact students and the school.

  • Be sure to tag the following university leaders. Feel free to also use any of the social media graphics below.
  • Include a link to the email letter campaign so supporters have a way to take action.

UMD President Darryll Pines
Instagram: @president_pines

Twitter: @President_Pines

Comment on these posts:
Quiet Campus

Do Good Challenge

Fearlessly Forward Reel

 

Comment on/Quote tweet these tweets:
Quiet Campus

Commencement Fireworks

Suggestions on what to write:
It sure is a quiet campus when UMD has laid off the staff who directly serve our students and faculty. The State of MD increased its funding to the USM, yet you still laid people off.

Clearly, UMD does not care about “doing good”. Instead of laying off AFSCME members who directly serve our students and faculty, why not look at all the $$$ you’re spending on consultants and top-level administrators?

UMD is not leading fearlessly forward if your first thought was to lay off hard-working staff. Union busting isn’t moving #MarylandForward.

It’s AFSCME members who make important events like commencement happen, but instead, you’ve laid them off. Students and faculty deserve better. Who’s going to do the work that those who were laid off were doing?

UMD Vice President for Student Affairs
Instagram: @pattyperillo

Comment on these posts:
Fearlessly Forward

Suggestions on what to write:
You’re not moving #MarylandForward by laying off hard-working staff and union busting. Students deserve UMD leadership that can actually lead with courage. Reverse the layoffs and work with the union.

BSU President Aminta Breaux
Twitter: @PresBreaux

Comment on/Quote tweet this tweet:
Mackenzie Scott Gift

Suggestions on what to write:
If you actually cared about investing in Maryland’s oldest HBCU, you would invest in BSU’s hard-working staff instead of laying them off. You’re only hurting Bowie’s students by laying off the staff that make BSU possible.

Other Post Ideas:

@[Insert Handle Here]: As a supporter of the University of Maryland, I am disappointed that you went right to laying off union members without taking a pay cut yourself.

@[Insert Handle Here] likes to say [UMD/BSU] treats all employees like family. Hypocritical of you to then lay off some of your hardest working staff who directly support students and faculty.

Shame on @[Insert Handle Here] for laying off union members without considering other options. The State has given you the money. You didn’t have to do this, and it’s cruel and heartless.

For Student and Alumni Groups at UMD

Thank you for helping us reverse the layoffs at UMD and supporting union workers. Below is a sample email for communicating with your organization’s members.

Sample Email

[Student Group Name] Members: 

UMD staff need our help. In June, over 70 of them were laid off at UMD. 

Please take two minutes to send a letter to UMD President Darryll Pines and the University System of Maryland’s Board of Regents to demand they reverse the layoffs.

These staff members were all union workers covered by AFSCME (American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees) Local 1072, which represents over 4,000 staff at the University of Maryland.

Once these layoffs happen, these positions are ELIMINATED. That means that the important work they were doing — from planning events for students to fixing IT issues to providing mental health services — will no longer be done. 

The fact of the matter is that these layoffs were UNNECESSARY. UMD has had significant increases in state funding, increased tuition year after year, and cited record fundraising. UMD also did not make any attempt to work with our union to find other solutions. 

Please send a letter to President Pines and the Board of Regents, and share this action with everyone you know. There is already a sample letter included you can use.

When UMD treats the staff who provide student-focused support services as dispensable, they’re abandoning students. Please take action and help fight back against these layoffs.

[Sign-off]