Worker Institute

This podcast describes the essential role played by ILR’s Worker Institute in creating and supporting the new NYC Building Trades Peer Support Network, and it discusses the need for the network and how it will reduce suicide attempts and improve the mental health of construction workers.

Risa Lieberwitz, ILR professor of labor and employment law, provided expertise on the negotiating position of the Harvard graduate workers union, noting that it goes beyond a finances; for example, the union is asking for expanded protections for international students.

Risa Lieberwitz, ILR professor of labor and employment law, shared her expertise, saying that increasing class size amounts to increasing workload, and even if increasing from 10 students to 15 students falls within an employer’s discretion, the change’s impact may require Harvard to negotiate with the union.

ILR’s Worker Institute is noted as a partner of the new Building Trades Support Network, which will train peer supporters to assist with improving the mental health of New York City construction workers.

A report co-written by ILR’s Worker Institute, about how AI is affecting the careers of fashion models, is quoted in this article.

“I can imagine when she was trying to co-create this union with him, how much it would have cost her to speak up,” said Patrica Campos-Medina, executive director of ILR’s Worker Institute, commenting on allegations of sexual abuse within the United Farm Workers movement.

Gary LaBarbera says the Building and Construction Trades Council was “especially lucky” to have worked with Arianna Schindle and Jeff Grabelski, both from ILR’s Worker Institute, when developing a new peer support network aimed at improving construction workers’ mental health.

ILR’s Worker Institute is mentioned as a partner in the development and delivery of the curriculum for the new Building Trades Peer Support Network, which aims to train approximately 1,000 workers in the NYC construction industry as peer supporters, in order to improve mental health and reduce suicide rates.

ILR’s Worker Institute, which is a partner in the new Building Trades Peer Support Network, contributed to the network’s approach by confirming that peer-to-peer interventions work better for improving construction worker mental health than top-down interventions.

ILR’s Worker Institute is mentioned as a partner in the new Building Trades Peer Support Network, which aims to improve construction workers’ mental health by training approximately 1,000 workers throughout the trades and across job sites in New York City as peer supporters.

The ILR School’s Worker Institute and unions have launched an innovative peer support initiative to destigmatize mental health and reduce suicide in New York City’s construction industry.

“This is precisely the kind of initiative that Cornell ILR supports as we pursue our public service mission,” said Patrica Campos-Medina, executive director of ILR’s Worker Institute, about the institute’s contribution to the Building Trades Peer Support Network curriculum, which aims to improve NYC construction workers’ mental health.

ILR’s Worker Institute is mentioned as a partner in the development of the new Building Trades Peer Support Network, an initiative to destigmatize mental health and reduce suicide in New York City’s construction industry by leveraging relationships within unions.

A new book, “Legalized Inequalities: Immigration and Race in the Low-Wage Workplace,” is profiled in this article. The book was co-authored by ILR researchers Kate Griffith, Shannon Gleeson and Patricia Campos-Medina, along with Darlène Dubuisson of the University of California, Berkeley.

A report from ILR’s Worker Institute is referenced in this article about how delivery apps contribute to problems faced by gig workers in New York City’s food delivery industry.

Patrica Campos-Medina, executive director of the Worker Institute, suggests next steps for protecting the labor rights of gig workers, following recent changes in New York City to how grocery delivery workers are compensated and food delivery platforms encourage tipping.

In this blogcast, Patrica Campos-Medina, executive director of ILR’s Worker Institute, explores migration, belonging, worker power and the everyday people shaping the future of immigrant worker justice with Burnes Center for Social Change Senior Fellow Seth Harris.

Zoë West, extension associate at ILR’s Worker Institute, discusses AI in the fashion industry on this BBC audio program.

Using generative AI, fashion designers can use digital photos to adjust models’ features and even deploy fully digital avatars in place of humans. A team including an ILR School researcher has written a paper highlighting models’ challenges.

Patrica Campos-Medina, executive director of ILR’s Worker Institute, is mentioned as a 2025 Schneps Media Leaders of Labor awardee; the award, which recognizes members of the labor community and the organizations that support them, will be presented on Oct. 8 at Terrace on the Park in Queens, New York.

Risa Lieberwitz, ILR professor of labor and employment law, comments on recent workplace firings and employers’ heightened fear of political reprisal.

“It’s a celebration of solidarity with TPS workers,” said Patricia Campos-Medina executive director of The Worker Institute and primary researcher for the “Stories of Belonging” public art and storytelling exhibit about the contributions of immigrants with Temporary Protected Status in the U.S.

A report co-authored by the Worker Institute reveals problems with AI-driven image manipulation in the fashion modeling industry.

Zoë West, a senior researcher of worker rights and equity at ILR’s Worker Institute, comments on issues raised by the latest Empire State poll about balancing unpaid caretaking and paid work. West contributed to the poll project, which was highlighted in ILR’s 2024-25 New York at Work report.

Now in its fifth year, the 2024-25 New York at Work report draws on ILR expertise, research-based data and policy analysis on a broad range of key issues affecting the state’s workers, unions, communities and employers.

This article references a 2018 study by the Laundry Workers Center and Cornell University’s Worker Institute, which found that 86 percent of laundromat workers in New York City are women, most of them immigrants.

Labor organizers and activists from Elmont and other Long Island neighborhoods rallied for immigrant workers’ rights at the Stories of Belonging celebration, at Sisters of St. Joseph Preparatory School in Brentwood, on June 18.