Airport workers across the country are coming together to signify the next wave of workers demanding recognition of their worth. In North Carolina, airport service workers won their first major victory at Charlotte Douglas International Airport (CLT) earlier this year when 500 workers—ramp agents, cabin cleaners, lavatory and water agents, high lift truck drivers and pro shop workers—voted to form their union, joining a growing movement of workers organizing across the South. Now, these workers are rising up with SEIU and working people across the nation to demand that Congress write airport service workers into the Federal Aviation Administration’s reauthorization, demanding GOOD wage and benefit standards at major airports across the country!

Universities and their administrations have come to rely on graduate student workers to fulfill their missions but have done little to support these workers or pay them a living wage. Graduate student workers have said enough is enough, and at Duke University, these students have taken steps to form their union and push back. This month, the Duke Graduate Students Union OFFICIALLY WON their union with Workers United Southern Regional Joint Board! Now, they can demand Duke University join them at the bargaining table. This win comes after 6+ years of fighting. Duke University Graduate Students now join a slew of graduate student unions united with SEIU, including those at Loyola (Chicago), Tufts, and Emory.

Over the last few years 8,500+ Starbucks workers have joined together to build power with Starbucks Workers United. Their demands echo what so many working people across the country are calling for: better wages, affordable healthcare, and better scheduling to ensure security and stability in their lives. But as 330+ stores have formed their unions, Starbucks has waged an unprecedented union-busting campaign and has refused to come to the table to listen to workers. In North Carolina, Starbucks Workers have voted to unionize six stores, and as new stores unionize nearly everyday across the country, that number will surely grow. SEIU is united with Starbucks workers as they call out a rigged system, demand accountability for retaliation and stall tactics, educate and rally customers, and ultimately win their contracts.

As a legacy of slavery and Jim Crow era laws, Southern workers—a majority Black and brown workers—have been excluded from the right to form a union. SEIU and The Union of Southern Service Workers (USSW) are fighting to change that. In North Carolina and across the South, service workers are organizing to win structural changes and fighting to transform our low wage, high turnover jobs into good union jobs. USSW joins together a diverse group of fast-food, retail, warehouse and home care workers to organize around one shared set of demands for all service industry employers. Together workers are standing up to greedy corporations to get what's rightfully theirs: a seat at the table and real decision making power about their working conditions.