Graduate teaching assistants at Yale University will begin a five-day strike today, following repeated refusals by university administrators to allow them to form a labor union.

The Graduate Employees and Students Organization (GESO), which represents teaching assistants in the social sciences and humanities, announced that it would strike this week if administrators did not agree to hold a vote regarding their demand to be recognized as a labor union for purposes of collective bargaining.

GESO's March 31 deadline passed last week with no university response, and the self-styled teaching assistants' union announced a strike for this week.

GESO spokesperson Eve Weinbaum predicted that between 350 and 400 TAs will strike.

The Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences (GSAS) enrolls about 1,000 social sciences and humanities students, of which around 400 are teaching assistants, according to Weinbaum, a fifth-year political science student.

"Seventy percent of classes taught by graduate students will be shut down," Weinbaum predicted.

In defiance of Yale President Richard C. Levin, GESO will hold an unofficial "election" of its own on April 6, according to Gordon Lafer, spokesperson for the Federation of University Employees.

The Federation includes Locals 34 and 35--the two recognized unions atYale--which comprise clerical, technical,maintenance, custodial, groundskeeping and dininghall workers. The Federation seeks to add GESO asa third recognized labor union.

The unofficial "election" will be conducted bythe New Haven, Conn. office of the League of WomenVoters and supervised by Rev. Jerry Streets, theYale University chaplain, according to Lafer.

"While it is not legally binding, it is hopedthat a pro-union vote, together with the week-longstrike, will persuade administrators to honor therequest of its teaching staff and negotiate acontract in good faith," a Federation statementreads.

That appears unlikely, given President Levin'sand other Yale administrators' adamant refusals toconsider the groups' demands.

"The National Labor Relations Board has ruledon a number of cases that graduate students arenot employees for the purposes of collectivebargaining that they are students," Associate VicePresident for Administration Peter D. Vallone saidin a interview last night.

"They're not being denied anything," addedVallone, who is Yale's chief labor negotiator."They talk like they have a right to collectivebargaining. They don't."

Weinbaum said TAs receive inadequate pay andbenefits. The standard yearly pay for a TA is$9,360, $2,000 less than Yale's official estimateof the cost of living in New Haven, according toWeinbaum, TAs may be fired at any time and mustpay for their own health care, she added.

"At Yale you can't support yourself byteaching," Weinbaum said. "A lot of TAs getoutside jobs. It means you can't spend the timeand energy on the teaching."

But Vallone refuted GESO's figures. Yale's costof living estimate describes the needs of typicalfull-time employees who support families, he said,and do not apply to graduate students.