Labor Extension Program logo

For further information contact the extension coordinator in your area:

Amherst
Dale Melcher, Coordinator
Labor Relations and Research Center
Gordon Hall

418 N. Pleasant St.
UMass Amherst
Amherst, MA 01003
dmelcher@lrrc.umass.edu
413-545-6166 • 413-545-0110 fax

Boston
Tess Ewing, Coordinator
CPCS Labor Resource Center
UMass Boston
100 Morrissey Blvd
Boston, MA 02125
tess.ewing@umb.edu
617-287-7352 • 617-287-7404 fax

Dartmouth
Kim Wilson, Coordinator
UMass Dartmouth
Dubin Labor Education Center
285 Old Westport Road
N. Dartmouth, MA 02747
kwilson@umassd.edu
508-999-8781• 508-999-9168 fax

Lowell
Susan Winning, Coordinator

Mike Prokosch,

Coordinator
Work Environment Program
UMass Lowell
Lowell, MA 01854
susan_winning@uml.edu
978-934-3127 • 978-934-4033 fax

 

The University of Massachusetts

Labor Extension Program

Providing union education to build a strong labor movement.

Labor Extension Bulletin now available for download.

What is the Labor Extension Program?

The UMass. Labor Extension Program is a state wide effort, based in the UMass campuses at Amherst, Boston, Dartmouth, and Lowell, to provide training and education to workers, their unions, and other workers' organizations. The focus of the program is on strengthening these organizations, increasing activism, and building the skills necessary to effectively advocate for the needs and concerns of the workforce.

The Labor Extension Program helps unions and other worker organizations to fully and effectively represent an increasingly diverse membership, to train a new generation of union leaders to face the challenges of the future, and to prepare all workers, organized and unorganized to exercise their full rights in the work place and the community.

How does the Program Work?

We offer programming in a variety of formats for individual unions, central labor councils, and union members, including short courses, seminars, conferences, and special programs on a broad range of subject areas. We contract with unions to custom design programs for their members, officers and staff. We also offer open enrollment programs that anyone may attend for a small fee.

Finally, we provide assistance and support to labor organizations in the development and delivery of their own educational programs.

A Training Session
Isabel Lopez from MassCOSH and Monica Ceccatto from the SEIU 285 Worker Education Program enjoy a moment at Training of Trainers for Labor Extension's new Worker Rights Curriculum.

To see why they are smiling, check out our Worker Rights Curriculum

 

Labor Extension Bulletin

To learn more about what the UMass Labor Extensiuon Program does, download current and past issues of our newsletter, the Labor Extension Bulletin.

January, '08


September, '07

May, '07

January, '07

September, '06

May, 06

January, '06

September, '05

May, '05

January, '05

September, '04

May, '04

January, '04

September, '03

May, '03

January, '03

September, '02

May, '02

January, '02

September '01

May, '01

January, '01

Notices

Open Enrollment Classes

around the state

Spring, 2008

This spring, the UMass. Labor Extension Program will be offering a number of open-enrollment classes, workshops, discussions and speakers at our 4 campuses.

Topics include:

  • Collective Bargaining
  • Strategic Research
  • Popular Education
  • Health & Safety
  • The Economy
  • Immigration
  • and more.

For a detailed listing, click here.

 

Resources on Immigration

Immigration is a major topic these days in the country as a whole, and in the labor movement in particular. What is organized labor saying about immigration? What are the facts? What are the major debates and points of view?

The Labor Extension Program has teamed up with the Labor Committee in Support of Immigrant Worker Rights to pull together articles, fact sheets, and other references on immigration and its effects on the lives of working people-- both the native born and the immigrants themselves.

Click here for the Immigration Page.

The Boss can't do that, can he?

Worker Rights Curriculum Available

Updates include new state and federal minimum wage

We have updated the Minimum Wage and Overtime modules of the Workers Rights Curriculum, as well as the resource pages "In a Nutshell", to reflect the current state ands federal minimum wages, as of July 24, 2007. Click here for updated versions.

 

New Pictures for Workers Rights Curriculum uploaded 10/04/06

Spanish Version being developed; most modules available now

The UMass Labor Extension Program has developed a Worker Rights Curriculum and it is available for download from this site.

The curriculum is for work with immigrant workers, students, and others new to or rejoining the US workforce. Topics addressed include an introduction to basic worker protections, how to read a pay check, minimum wage, rights of workers under 18, overtime, protection from discrimination, health and safety, the FMLA, unemployment insurance, contingent work, and unions and the right to organize.

The curriculum is approximately ten hours long when all parts are used, but it can be broken up into smaller pieces. Individual topic modules range from 45 minutes to two hours. A degree of English literacy is needed although the curriculum uses pictures to adapt to lower literacy levels.

To see or download the curriculum click here.

Spanish Version Being Developed

We are in the process of preparing Spanish versions of the participants' materials. Most modules are now available for download. The rest will be posted as they become available.

For Materials in Spanish, click here.

Using the Curriculum

If your organization would be interested in training on any of the topics above, please contact the Coordinator at the campus nearest you (see left side of page).

You can also simply download the materials and use them yourselves. If you do that, we would appreciate getting your feedback on how well the curriculum worked, as well as your suggestions for improvements.

Please Send us Your Feedback

If you have piloted the Workers Rights Curriculum, or any part of it, with your organization, please take a moment to complete our feedback form.

Workers Rights for ESOL and ABE Learners

Recent immigrants to this country are among the people who could gain most from classes on workers rights. Since our curriculum is aimed at people with some literacy in English, we encourage teachers of ESOL or ABE to adapt the curriculum as needed for use with people with limited English proficiency.


We would also encourage ESOL and ABE teachers to send us their adaptations and let us post them on this web site.

For an example, Jenny Utech, of the Mass. Worker Education Roundtable, has kindly shared an ESOL curriculum she developed based on the Health and Safety module of the Workers Rights curriculum. To download it, click here.

Revised Pages

This Curriculum is frequently revised, based on feedback we get from users as well as changes in the laws. As we finish our revisions, we post them on this website. Click here for revised pages.