Jasmine Kerrissey, sociology graduate student, has received a $10,000 National Science Foundation Fellowship award to study whether or not union mergers can help reverse declining union membership.  
 
Using archival data from 1886-2000, she will examine union membership growth, degree of union democracy, and union organizational structure changes directly before and after mergers took place during this time period to determine their effects on membership.  
 
The study will run from August 2009-July 2010.  
 
Kerrissey is in her sixth year of graduate study at UCI under advisor and professor Judith Stepan-Norris, sociology.