David Yantorno

Tefere Gebre, executive vice president of the AFL-CIO and the Alice B. Grant Labor Leader in Residence at Cornell, speaks at Union Days 2015.

The Worker Institute at Cornell sponsored Union Days 2015, themed “Labor on the Line: Breaking Boundaries, Building Movements,” April 7-8.

Hosted by the ILR School, the annual event provided students, faculty, alumni and the public with labor-focused events and a keynote speech by Tefere Gebre, executive vice president of the AFL-CIO and the Alice B. Grant Labor Leader in Residence at Cornell.

Gebre spoke about how a union job in college spurred his passion for helping labor. “I was a loader. It was the hardest job that I ever did,” he said. “I was working during my break and this guy came to me and said I couldn’t do that. Someone is telling me that I had work rules and that was how I got into the labor movement.”

Gebre focused on what the United States needs to do as a whole to ensure that all workers are treated well: “Our agenda this year is raising wages … Americans need a raise across the board.”

Events included a panel, “Broadening the Labor Movement, Innovative Organizing,” with Sean Sellers, co-founder and senior investigator at the Fair Food Standards Council; Silvia Fabela, senior campaign coordinator for Making Change at Walmart; Michelle Jim ’14, a strategic campaign organizer for Jobs with Justice; Rana Jaleel, a postdoctoral fellow at Columbia Law School; and Patricia Campos-Medina ’96, co-director of the New York State/AFL-CIO Union Leadership Institute.

The event also included a Social Justice Career Fair, presentations by muralist and street artist Mike Alewitz, and a dance choreographed by Jumay Chu, senior lecturer in the Department of Performing and Media Arts.

Haley Veasco ’15 is a writer intern for the ILR School.