Members of NYU’s RA union are claiming they have not received compensation for this semester that was due nearly a month ago, calling the university’s delayed payments a “severe breach” of their newly established contract.

According to the collective bargaining agreement that Student Workers at NYU reached with administrators in December, RAs should have received their first payment around Jan. 15, and additional ones on a semimonthly basis. In a Feb. 6 email to union members, SWAN said that NYU has yet to start the payment process or provide a timeline for when it would begin — noting that missed payments currently amount to $700-$900 per RA. Union members are also waiting on $2,600 in back pay for the fall 2025 semester.

NYU spokesperson Joseph Tirella told WSN the university would pay RAs for this semester by late March or early April, and that union representatives were informed of the schedule in a December meeting. 

“This is part of the ongoing process of implementing a new collective bargaining agreement and onboarding nearly 300 new employees in university systems,” Tirella wrote in a statement to WSN. “We have been working consistently since mid-December to complete this multistep process and we are moving as quickly as possible to make these payments.”

Dan Maron, SWAN’s unit chair and a CAS junior, told WSN that administrators at NYU’s Office of Employee Relations and Office of Equal Opportunity attributed the stipend delays to “technical issues.” On Monday, RAs received an email with instructions to complete forms to finalize their onboarding process in order to receive payments. 

In the Thursday email, signed by Maron and four other representatives, the union said members prepared for a “minor delay” in payments, but that administrators had said they didn’t expect a “very drawn out process.” SWAN said that NYU did not disclose that the semimonthly paychecks “would be delayed this much.”

“I doubt it has to take that long, and I do believe they’re dragging their feet a bit,” Maron said. “People are graduating, people need this. People were told that they’re going to have this by the beginning of the semester and made financial decisions dependent on that.”

Maron said that SWAN filed a grievance last Wednesday after meeting with the employee relations office, giving the university 10 days to respond to the complaint under the union’s contract. SWAN has asked RAs to testify to how the delayed payments have affected them personally, and Maron said several RAs prioritized this role over other unpaid commitments.

“The university seems to not really recognize how serious it is for so many of us,” Maron said. “We want everybody to know how important this is to us, and how much we are fighting for our contract to be fulfilled for our RAs to be paid. We want people to read up, be informed and show us what it means to them, so that they’re affected, or angry.” 

Contact Amanda Chen at [email protected].