About

Who we are

The Teaching and Research Assistants at Concordia (TRAC) Union is a local of the Public Service Alliance of Canada. As a local of a labour union, TRAC negotiates working conditions and pay rates and defends the labour rights of our members through our Collective Agreement.

We also provide different services for our members to improve their working conditions and address potential workplace issues.

TRAC is an advocate for the betterment of working conditions, rights and benefits of its members through collective bargaining, grievance handling, information sharing and education in order to achieve fair and equitable treatment.

What TRAC stands for

More broadly, the goals of TRAC are to study, protect, and develop the professional, socioeconomic, cultural, and political interests of its members and workers in general. TRAC promotes values of social solidarity, equity, tolerance and sharing to build a fairer society free of discrimination, violence, oppression and exploitation; a society that makes it possible to ensure that everyone is able to contribute to their fullest potential and in dignity. To advance these goals, TRAC collaborates with other unions and employee associations, student groups and associations, and relevant campus and community groups.

Our positions

Ukraine

TRAC stands in solidarity with the people of Ukraine as they face down Russian aggression. We call upon the Canadian government to accelerate the arrival of refugees and to stand unambiguously in opposition to the escalation of hostilities. Sabre-rattling should not be met with more sabre-rattling.

We also note that the invasion of Ukraine has elicited a different kind of response than has the wars in Yemen or Afghanistan, and similarly call upon the Canadian government to take an unambiguously pro-peace stance in those conflicts, including the acceleration of refugee acceptance and the cessation of military aid.

We have made a donation to the Red Cross to support the safety of refugees worldwide and call for an end to military conflict.

COVID-19 Pandemic

Dear fellow workers,

As you all know, we are entering a new stage of the pandemic.

Despite the fact that this pandemic has been going on for almost two years, Concordia still seems to be making up their plans as they go along. First they said that things would be online until January 10. Then, it was January 19th. Who knows what date they will say next?

There is no doubt to us at TRAC Union, based on current case counts and booster vaccination timelines that January 19th is too early. Many students will not even be eligible for a booster until January 21st, and this does no’t account for the time it takes for the booster to take effect. The earliest it could conceivably be safe to go back is February 7th – any day earlier than that is unacceptable.

Current booster shot eligibility requirements indicate that university workers are included under “school staff”, meaning that TRAC members are now eligible for their third dose. We recommend getting vaccinated as soon as possible, and bringing a pay stub as proof of university employment.

As educators, students, and workers, we want nothing more than to be able to enjoy each other’s company in an in-person classroom environment. After 18 months online, this past fall was a welcomed return. But now we are back in the thick of it, and the time has come again for us to fight together to make sure that we are all safe at work. The last thing anyone wants are outbreaks in classrooms – no one should have to pick between their education, their paycheque, and their health.

For that reason, we also insist that Concordia provide N95 masks to all who work on campus, just as they have previously supplied blue surgical masks.

We want to affirm to you that, if Concordia returns to in-person learning before it is safe to do so, we will stand behind and support any member who wishes to work from home because they do not feel safe.

No work but safe work!

In solidarity,
TRAC

Wet'suwet'en

TRAC stands in solidarity with Wet'suwet'en land defenders facing brutal colonial violence as they defend their territory from the encroachment of the Coastal GasLink pipeline. For years, Coastal GasLink has invaded Wet'suwet'en territory with the support of the RCMP. Land defenders set up the Gidimt'en checkpoint to prevent Coastal GasLink from drilling underneath Wedzin Kwa, their sacred headwaters. However, on November 18, heavily armed RCMP officers stormed the checkpoint and violently arrested 15 land defenders, supporting the pipeline's construction.

TRAC calls on Coastal GasLink and the RCMP to abide by the eviction notice served to them by Wet'suwet'en land defenders and stand down from their raiding of the Gidimt'en checkpoint.

Furthermore, we call for the immediate release of those land defenders whom the RCMP has unjustly arrested in defence of their territory. Lastly, we call upon our members to support #WetsuwetenStrong wherever they can by showing up in solidarity at protests and actions in support of the Wet'suwet'en. As a labour union working on stolen land in Tiohti:áke, we must support struggles for Indigenous sovereignty across Turtle Island.

Bill 2

Recently Simon Jolin-Barrette, Minister of Justice under the CAQ Government, proposed Bill 2, An Act respecting family law reform with regard to filiation and amending the Civil Code in relation to personality rights and civil status.

Based on §71 of the Civil Code, the amendment would read:

“A person who has undergone medical treatments and surgical operations involving a structural alteration of the person’s sexual organs and designed to permanently change that person’s apparent sexual characteristics may, if the conditions prescribed by this Code and by government regulation have been met, have the designation of sex appearing in their act of birth and, if necessary, their given names changed.”

The Bill will require transgender, intersex, and non-binary people to have undergone gender-affirming surgery to change their sex on their birth certificate and pieces of identification.

This means that for those who have not yet undergone or choose not to have gender-affirming surgery, their only option will be to have the gender they identify with appearing as an added category on their birth certificate and pieces of identification, in addition to their sex at birth listed. Their gender will appear as either Male (M), Female (F), or Non-binary (X).

“Where an application for the addition of a designation of gender identity is granted, the act of birth of the person who is the subject of the application is then altered by the addition of a designation referring to a male, female or non-binary identity, as the case may be. A government regulation determines the letter symbols to be used to represent that designation.”

This will pressure gender non-conforming people to get surgery to meet the requirements when they may not have opted for surgery.

Let’s not forget that the ability to have surgery in the province of Quebec is rather complicated and that waitlists are long.

Having this added category of gender appear on ID would subject trans people to discrimination and transphobia, and expose a profoundly personal matter to others as they move through the world when showing their identification for any service that requires it.

In other words, Bill 2 requires people to have surgery to be respected and recognized. This does not value bodily autonomy and invalidates the trans experience in many ways, which creates an expectation that to be trans, one must have surgery. This is inherently problematic and with which TRAC disagrees. This has implications for the broader queer community as well.

This comes after Quebec abolished the sterilizing surgery requirement for gender marker changes on October 1, 2015. So why are we moving backwards?

Although the CAQ recently announced that the surgery requirement would be dropped, many of the proposed changes to Bill 2 still leave queer and trans individuals in a highly vulnerable situation.

TRAC Union is firmly and vehemently opposed to Bill 2 and its proposed changes. We recognize that many of our TA and RA members face discrimination and transphobia. However, this is fundamentally in opposition to our Canadian Chart of Rights and Freedoms of equality and the right to equal protection without discrimination based on sex, or sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression.

TRAC is committed to protecting its members and workers in general, to promote values of equity and tolerance to build a society free of discrimination, violence, and oppression and exploitation.

Palestine

TRAC stands in #solidarity with the Palestinian people and condemns the attacks at #AlAqsaMosque by Israeli forces, the airstrikes on Gaza, and the confiscation of homes at #SheikhJarrah. We call on the administration of Concordia to stand up for human rights and against colonial injustice.

Return to campus letter

Dear Concordia officials,

We are writing this open letter to let you know that we are concerned about the current plan to return to campus for Fall 2021 and the lack of information available to students, student employees, faculty, and staff. We are now a few weeks away from the beginning of the semester, and yet there remains tremendous uncertainty about the kind of campus we will be returning to. Messaging from the university has been infrequent, and what information we have received as to the status of campus in Fall 2021 inspires little but concern.

The current plan, that a 75% vaccination threshold amongst Quebecois students will enable a full return to campus with no social distancing, fills us with significant hesitation and dread.

As students, workers, and faculty, we have experienced firsthand the tremendous impact which a year of online schooling has had on our capacities to learn, work, and teach and on our collective well-being outside of the classroom. We want nothing more than to be able to see each other in person, to return to campus and enjoy the tangible benefits of learning and working as a community.

But, that said, we also must give precedence to the safety of ourselves, our friends, our families, and our wider city. A 75% vaccination rate across Quebec, of course, does not necessarily mean that 75% of Concordia students will be vaccinated, let alone 75% in every classroom. Many international students have had limited access to vaccines due to intellectual property restrictions inhibiting the diffusion of supply worldwide. The Delta variant has proven capable of resisting vaccinations, and the rise of further vaccine-resistant strains remains a possibility. Simply put, the pandemic is not over.

We, therefore, ask for three simple things.

Firstly, we ask that you commit to mandatory physical distancing in classrooms for Fall 2021 and for as long as the diffusion of COVID19 remains a pressing risk for members of the Concordia community. We know that the wearing of masks reduces rates of transmission indoors, yet physical distancing is also a key component to this equation so long as COVID will continue to be a part of our lives. We see a campus ‘as normal’ - undistanced - as presenting fertile soil for a serious outbreak of what is now a far more transmissible and dangerous disease than it was when the campus first closed in March 2020. This would be easily mitigated by a mandatory physical distancing policy.

Secondly, we ask that Concordia have a frequent cleaning schedule to ensure that if/when there is an outbreak of the transmission of the virus, the time of transmission would be limited. Cleaning high-traffic areas of the school several times per day is vital to limiting the transmission of this deadly virus and variants in a school of over 50, 000 students. This will ensure students, student employees, faculty, and staff are working in a safe and healthy environment. If we are being forced to learn and work in person, Concordia must ensure they are doing everything they can to protect their Concordia community. We are putting our lives and the lives of our family and friends we come into contact within your hands, please remember this when making all decisions.

Finally, we ask for better and more frequent communication of plans and updates over the next few weeks and into the semester. As students, workers, and faculty, we should not be making individual decisions pertaining to our own health and safety entirely in the dark. We would like to see the university disseminate its plans or strategy in case of an outbreak on campus. We understand and acknowledge that it is difficult to make concrete plans when circumstances are known to change so rapidly. But, we have been down this road before, and, as a result, we should know how to plan for different scenarios so as to ensure that there will not be any outbreaks at Concordia. ‘The situation is changing rapidly’ was perhaps a reasonable explanation for the lack of clarity on plans last year, but it no longer holds the same amount of water. We have 18 months of experience to draw upon. We have a good sense of how this virus is transmitted, therefore the university should be able to communicate its plans clearly, both those based on present circumstances and on potential scenarios. All we ask for is clarity.

No return to campus except a safe return to campus.

Sincerely,
TRAC

Residential Schools

While many of you may still choose to recognize Canada Day, we will be taking the day to reflect and learn from Indigenous voices. As students and workers at a settler-colonial institution, we have much unlearning to do—a process that will take much longer than a single day.

Many of you may be familiar with the Grey Nuns Building on campus. The Grey Nuns, or Sisters of Charity of Montreal, are a Catholic order founded in the city in 1737. The nuns worked at many residential schools across the country and have recently refused to turn over information requested by the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation. Information about the building on Concordia’s websites contains no reference to the atrocities of the residential school system. In fact, the site is celebrated for its “outstanding heritage.” We believe that the truth about the Grey Nuns should be made transparent and that the site should not be celebrated.

About PSAC

TRAC is the directly chartered branch, local 12500, of the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC), a national union that represents more than 180 000 workers in every province and territory in Canada, as well as locations around the world. PSAC members work for federal government departments and agencies, Crown corporations, universities, community services agencies and Aboriginal communities, among several other sectors. PSAC is headquartered in Ottawa with 23 regional offices across Canada. You can find more information about PSAC on the PSAC website.