Power At Work Power At Work Blogcast #36: Building Power with Undergraduate Organizers with August Escandon, Abigail Thomas, & Mimi Yu
In this blogcast, Northeastern University students from Huskies Organizing with Labor, or HOWL, take over the Power At Work blog for a discussion about how to get involved on university campuses, use your leverage as a student, and organize alongside workers. Abigail Thomas, August Escandon, and Amelia (Mimi) Yu share HOWL's top five tenets for undergraduate organizing and tell stories from their previous campaigns.
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Mimi Yu (she/they) is a third year computer science and political science major. They became involved with Huskies Organizing With Labor (HOWL) during their first year at the beginning of the dining hall worker campaign. During their time with HOWL, they have helped grow the coalition and foster student-worker solidarity and relationships. One of the most memorable moments of their time with HOWL was seeing a collective of over 500 students, workers, and allies show up to march on campus to voice their support for the dining hall worker union. Since then, they have been involved with the Graduate Employees of Northeastern University campaign with HOWL and the Feminist Student Organization.
Abigail Thomas is a second year biology major and art minor at Northeastern. They joined HOWL during September 2022, right after the 2022 dining hall contract was won. During the 22-23 school year, they were involved in maintaining student worker solidarity through events, student coalition maintenance, and early support for the graduate workers union. Since 2023, Abigail has been involved in supporting Northeastern graduate workers through their unionization campaign win. They are also involved in NEUCovidResponse, a mutual aid project supplying resources for COVID prevention, providing education to students and faculty, and fighting the ongoing pandemic. They are also a student athlete.
August Escandon is a recent Northeastern graduate from Albuquerque, New Mexico. His areas of studies include health communications, social movement organization, and supply chain infrastructure. He was an organizer in Huskies Organizing With Labor beginning in May 2022, and supported Northeastern Dining Workers’ bargaining campaign and the Graduate Employees of Northeastern Union election campaign. He is currently trying to find his way in building collective power and community outside of Northeastern University’s own miniverse!