Hello, everyone! It’s been 30 days since we began the petition demanding Northeastern to continue paying dining workers, and we have almost 6,000 signatures right now. Thank you to everyone who has signed this petition! However, unlike MIT, Harvard, and Tufts, who have agreed to extend dining workers’ pay and medical benefits through the end of their academic semester, Northeastern has not even acknowledged our petition and has still yet to commit to paying the dining workers.
Right now, many of the dining workers who were laid off are seriously struggling, while other dining workers who are still going to work are doing so under the serious fear that they may contract the coronavirus and bring it home to their families. During this great crisis, we all need to come together in solidarity with dining workers to make sure they can safely support themselves and their family. Therefore, please consider donating some money to help dining hall workers from Northeastern and other universities in the Boston area. These funds will be used to replace wages and maintain family health insurance coverage during layoffs and reduced hours.
Regardless of your ability to donate, you can also send a letter to Michael Armini, Northeastern's Senior Vice President of External Affairs, and Thomas Nedell, Northeastern's Treasurer and Senior Vice President for Finance demanding that they support the dining workers through the COVID-19 pandemic. It is ridiculous that the Northeastern community must donate to support dining workers, rather than the university itself ensuring that the dining workers, who are an essential part of our community, have the stability they need during this global crisis. We need to let our university know that their treatment of the dining workers has been shameful!
Finally, I just want to thank everyone again, for signing and sharing our petition supporting the dining workers. Your support means a lot to us and together, if we continue to put pressure on the university, we can win this campaign to get Northeastern to continue paying dining workers through the pandemic.