NLRB Rules That Graduate Students Are Employees

Earlier today, the National Labor Relations Board ("the Board") issued its long awaited decision in Columbia University.  Not surprisingly, the Board, in a 3-1 decision, overturned 12 years of precedent by ruling that "student assistants" (including assistants engaged in research funded by external grants) who have a "common law" employment relationship with their university are employees as defined by the National Labor Relations Act (the "Act"), and therefore are entitled to the protections afforded to employees under the Act such as engaging in the right to unionize. 

The Board has equivocated on the issue of whether graduate students are employees as defined by the Act.  In 2000, the Board in its New York University decision determined that graduate students were employees under the Act.  Four years later in Brown University, the Board overturned New York University and held that graduate students were not employees.  With today's ruling, the Board has yet again