Students are showing support for Monday’s unionization vote for TCU Sodexo workers, and some are encouraging workers to vote yes.
Sodexo employees at TCU will vote Monday on labor union membership in reaction to recent benefits cuts. The election will determine if Sodexo workers at TCU Dining Services locations will be able to join the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) labor union.
Student Body President Cody Westphal posted a message on his personal Facebook account about the vote.
“I support the ability of workers to unionize should they choose to do so in order to create better wages and benefits for themselves and their families,” Westphal wrote. “I look forward to everyone having their voice heard.”
The campus chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) encouraged its members to support the unionization effort.
“We, the NAACP, have taken a stand to support the Sodexo employees to unionize,” wrote Kee-Kee Jackson, a senior social work major and the TCU NAACP press secretary, in an email to NAACP members.
“If you have time, please be encouraged to show your support,” Jackson wrote.
Students such as junior strategic communication major LaQwen Nichols and junior political science major Alexis Lohse stood outside Market Square this morning to talk to students about the vote.
“We’re giving them leaflets to put them on their trays as they send it to the back, leave it on a dirty table or just hold it up as they go through the line and let the workers know they have a right to vote yes,” Lohse said.
Sophomore biology major Joel Howard was one of those students who was handed a leaflet.
“I support the workers and what they’re trying to do,” Howard said.
Students left flyers reading “We support your right to vote yes for a secure future” on tables and in the dish return area of Market Square.
One Sodexo manager was seen taking a flyer off of the dish return and throwing it in the trash.
This manager, Darian Pace, area marketing manager for Sodexo at TCU, declined to comment on why he threw the flyer away.
TCU Sodexo employees will vote in a secret ballot election monitored by the National Relations Board (NLRB) this morning and this afternoon. The results will be tallied and announced tonight at 7 p.m. in the Brown-Lupton University Union.