Our History
Boston is a union town!
Unionization at Berklee is an ever-growing movement. Before our staff union came the Berklee Faculty Union (est. 1986) and the Studio Ops union IBEW 2222 (est. 2024). We are proud to join the rising tide of Berklee’s unionized community!
Learn more about our formation and recognition via the key dates in the following timeline:
Fall 2023 – After years of enduring challenging working conditions, limited benefits, and pay well below those at neighboring institutions, a few staff members began to wonder what a unionized workplace at Berklee might look like.
December 2023 – Those staff members began union research and contacted the National Labor Relations Board to learn about starting a union. An initial petition was drafted in an attempt to collect signatures for a union, which was met with equal parts excitement and judgement.
Spring 2024 – More research, recruitment, and conversations with the NLRB and others knowledgeable about unions. The union team continued to grow in numbers. By June, an initial connection was made with the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), which prompted information gathering and outreach to 700+ Berklee staff contacts.
By Fall 2024 – The budding organizing committee began hosting Zoom meetings with small staff contingencies to provide information and answer questions about the process ahead.
May 2025 – Boston Conservatory joined the efforts, sharing their knowledge and skill sets from the organizing work they had initiated in their own area. Although this delayed their own unionizing effort, they were committed to the belief that more people is more power.
September 2025 – Given the presence of ICE on campus in the preceding months, the organizing committee came together to write a petition centered on Berklee implementing better protections from ICE. This was delivered to the President’s Office as a group, prompting a round-table conversation but little action from the office after the fact.
Late September 2025 – Berklee laid off more than 70 non-unionized staff without notice. For weeks afterwards, co-workers feared for their own jobs while readjusting to even tighter workloads. Efforts were made, mainly through word of mouth, to compile a list of everyone who was missing.
October 2025 – After the layoffs, Conservatory students protested the loss of their stage managers and other essential performance staff, but received a stifled response. In solidarity with the students and laid-off staff, publicly available figures on administrator salaries and institutional debt were shared across campus. The administration’s response to facts anyone could look up was retaliation. It backfired. Colleagues who had never been involved stepped forward, and our resolve to keep organizing grew.
November 2025 – The beginning of the card campaign. Dozens of volunteer organizers worked together to connect with coworkers in and outside their departments, and helped to educate newcomers on what a union could do. Union authorization cards were collected in person and by mail, reaching people all across the state of Massachusetts and the country.
March 31, 2026 – A parade of organizing committee members, both virtual and in-person, marched to deliver the hundreds of signed union cards to the President’s Office, and formally requested voluntary recognition of the staff union.
April and May 2026 – Several meetings were held with select organizing committee members and HR regarding voluntary recognition.
September 2026 – After months of strenuous deliberation, the BCM & BCB Staff Union was officially certified by Berklee.
October 2026 and Beyond – Now that we’ve been recognized, the hard work of building our local and bargaining for our first contract can begin. We hope to include as many staff voices as possible!
