3. What rights would TAs, RAs, and proctors have if the NLRB rules they are ‘‘employees’’

under the NLRA? Yellowstone University (YU)

is a private university and within the jurisdiction of the NLRA. Its mission is to serve as a university in which the graduate and undergraduate schools operate as a single integrated facility.

YU has over 50 academic departments, approximately 37 of which offer graduate degrees. YU employs approximately 550 regular faculty members and has an unspecified number of short-term faculty appointments. Although student enrollment levels vary, over 1,300 are graduate students, 5,600 are undergraduate students, and 300 are medical students in various degree programs. Most graduate students seek PhDs, with an estimated 1,132 seeking doctorates and 178 seeking master’s degrees.

Each semester many of these graduate students are awarded a teaching assistantship

(TA), research assistantship (RA), or proctorship;

others receive a fellowship. Approximately 375 of these graduate students were TAs, 220 served as RAs, 60 were proctors, and an additional number received fellowships.

Although varying somewhat among the departments, a teaching assistantship generally is assigned to lead a small section of a large lecture course taught by a professor. Although functions of research assistants vary within departments, these graduate students, as the title implies, generally conduct research under a research grant received by a faculty member.

Proctors perform a variety of duties for university departments or administrative offices. Their duties depend on the individual needs of the particular department or the university administrative office in which they work and, thus, include a wide variety of tasks. Unlike TAs and RAs, proctors generally do not perform teaching or research functions. Fellowships do not require any classroom or departmental assignments;

those who receive dissertation fellowships are required to be working on their dissertation.