Sexual Assault Prevention Educators Union Voluntarily Recognized

Portland-based sexual assault prevention nonprofit Speak About It has voluntarily chosen to recognize its employees’ new union after they voted unanimously to form the association with the Maine Service Employees Association (SEIU-1989). Speak About It provides theater-based education on sexual assault and consent awareness to high school and college students across the country.  Its mission is to “educate, entertain, and empower students to create positive change within their communities, advocate for and practice healthy relationship habits, and prevent sexual violence.”

Members of the “Speak About Labor Union" say their main priorities are to achieve fair pay and benefits as well as better scheduling, power sharing, communication and transparency. The members, who work seasonally and part time, say they have a hard time managing their personal and professional lives as they juggle multiple part-time jobs. They want to create schedules that are more consistent and predictable.

“By forming a union, my coworkers and I want to create a more sustainable way to work at this company with long-term career prospects for us because we love the structure of the work, we love the students and we want to keep doing this,” said actor-educator Jenna Hess, a member of the Speak About It Labor Union. “I was nervous about what management’s response was going to be to our decision, but they have met us with kindness and understanding and have been so eager to know our needs. The beauty of being in a union is that this feels like a serious conversation, rather than something more casual.”

Founded at Bowdoin College in 2010, Speak About It uses real stories about sexuality and relationships submitted by young people to create one-hour shows that model healthy relationships and effective sexual assault prevention measures with an emphasis on sexual consent. Performances are followed by facilitated discussions with students to highlight these lessons. Speak About It educators also meet with student leaders to train them how to teach lessons to the broader student body.

“It’s taken a lot of work and commitment to go through this unionizing process together, but it’s been so rewarding because of the solidarity that we have. Folks have really been looking out for each other,” said actor-educator Sydney Avitia-Jacques. “The signs we’re getting from management show us that this can really be a mutually beneficial process that supports us in being as powerful as we want to be. We appreciate that the organization respects our right to organize and we look forward to a collaborative bargaining process.”

Avitia-Jacques, who also is on staff at the Southern Maine Workers Center, said that they weren’t sure if forming a union at such a such a part-time job would work, but is now grateful that they reached out for assistance from MSEA. In unionizing, they hope to create an environment that allows the educators to be their best selves on the job.

“Everyone at Speak About It works here because we really care about building consent culture and supporting students to make their campuses more into spaces that are how they want them to be,” said Avitia-Jacques. “It’s very hard and emotionally draining work that a lot of us have personal investment and experience with.”

Hess said that she was also skeptical of whether it made sense to start a union, but that Avitia-Jacques taught their colleagues the importance of legal protections and solidarity in the workplace.

“Unions support each other and I didn’t know that,” said Hess. "So now that we’re on this other side we have all of this community support that just feels so awesome. I want everyone to have that feeling. I would not be discouraged to try forming a union and see what happens because it might just work out.”