Southern California, North

CIR empowers residents to fight for change within their hospitals and the healthcare system as a whole, thus improving our ability to serve our patients and our communities.

CIR has taught me to advocate effectively for changes focusing on patient-centered care, to work in unity with a wide array of residents throughout the hospital and the country, and to push the administration to improve resident life overall.

I would like to improve the union’s overall reach, by incorporating more residents and helping them to utilize the union to fight for needed changes. In order for CIR to be an even more powerful voice, I would like to see the union create a more unified effort nationally.

As a non-traditional student who spent many years working as a community activist both here and abroad, I bring unique perspective. Over the last two years as an active member with CIR, I have initiated many efforts to increase resident, faculty and administrative diversity, involve residents in the decision making process through a hospital wide survey, initiate a LGBTQ advisory board, petition the police department for accountability, help residents achieve their visions for improvements in patient, and form a group of physicians to provide healthcare at direct political action events. These were all initiatives I started with the help of my fellow CIR delegates. In the past year, I have been working with the administration to increase overall diversity, securing over $15,000 in funding. I plan on continuing to focus on these efforts and to extend them to the union as a whole. In addition, I want to increase community outreach efforts. I feel strongly that it is through our connection to the communities that we serve that we can achieve power for the measures we communally desire to achieve.

Given the current political environment for organized labor in the United States, CIR has a responsibility to continue to fight on the national stage for workers rights. While we are a small union, it will take a unified effort on the national stage to push back the tide of anti-union legislation that is sweeping the country. At the same time, CIR must not lose sight of the union’s overall mission and continue to advocate and fight the important battles facing our fellow residents and patients at the hospitals where we work.