United Steelworkers organizer Robin Sowards will discuss the past, present and future of academic unions on Jan. 25 as part of the Department of History’s Alice and Staughton Lynd Working Class History Seminar.

Sowards, who has a Ph.D. in English literature, linguistics and philosophy from Cornell University, was a lead organizer for the Union for Pitt Faculty campaign as well as other academic unionization efforts.

Before taking a role at the USW, he was on the volunteer organizing committee at Duquesne University and went on to work on successful organizing campaigns at Point Park University and Robert Morris University. He teaches linguistics as an adjunct lecturer at Chatham University. 

The discussion will be from 4:30 to 6 p.m. Jan. 25 at 3702 Posvar Hall.