Takiyah Ali, the director of graduate studies at Lehman College and a PSC delegate, went above and beyond last semester when the Delegate Assembly held a member recruitment competition. The goal was to build the strength of our union. Each delegate was asked to sign up at least one new member in the month of December. Ali didn’t do that. She signed up 12.
Ali is someone who grew up in CUNY, as she put it–when she was still a student at Midwood High School she got a job at nearby Brooklyn College. And when she heard about the union’s membership goals, she stepped up. Ali generally likes to find new workers at Lehman because management often might not orient them into the union–union activists like Ali seek them out and get them to sign cards.
Takiyah Ali
“I dedicated a couple of hours over two days. It was really very simple,” Ali said. “It really is about meeting people where they are.”
She went around to different offices and found new members–many had thought they were already signed up because they learned about PSC-CUNY Welfare Fund benefits. But Ali made the case to people that being a dues-paying member was important because it doesn’t just strengthen the PSC but makes you a member of NYSUT and the AFT, the union’s state and national affiliates. That resonated with people, Ali said, because people saw that their dues entitled them not just to local representation but advocacy at the state and national levels. “Two for the price of one,” she said.
“The union brotherhood and sisterhood develops,” she said.
Ali said that she found it very effective to sign up people on campus electronically rather than with paper cards because the moment they sign up online they can see that the process is done and that they are now members. “The whole loop is closed,” Ali said.
Ali, in the spirit of rank-and-file shopfloor organizing, also recruited other union activists at Lehman to seek out new members. “They joined me in the walk through,” she said.
Ali was recognized for her above-and-beyond member sign up activism by Secretary Andrea Vásquez, who is leading the union’s ongoing membership drive, at the December Delegate Assembly. Ali also plans to keep signing up new members whenever she can.
“Particularly at a time when the federal government is choosing to target organizations for dismantling and defunding, strengthening our union is crucial,” Vásquez said. “Union membership is at the core of our collective power and members like Takiyah Ali put a face on the union for new and veteran CUNY employees. Members signing up members and members activating members will carry us through these times and ensure that we come out stronger. Everyone can do something and that is what it will take to keep our city and neighbors safe, win good budgets for CUNY and a good contract for our members. It all starts with union membership and Vote COPE contributions to support our political work.”
When asked what inspired her to do this work, Ali recalled working PSC with members long before she joined the union. She credits PSC veterans like Robert Cermele, a retiree, former PSC chapter chair at City Tech, and the current PSC-CUNY Welfare Fund treasurer, for showing her when she was young why membership participation in a union strengthened rights for workers on the job.
“I learned under people who had strong values and loved the union,” she said. “I learned a lot from my mentors.”
Published: January 16, 2026
