Nolan Strikes Again
Former MSA President and current law student Matt Nolan once again displays his inability to get it — this time, the distinction between grad school and preprofessional school. “[T]hey are still taking classes,” he writes. Not the PhD candidates, who also throw off the GEO opposition’s figures about the cost of tuition waivers. “[T]hey’re students — just like you and me, except they get free tuition and a boatload of money in a stipend.” Yeah, grad students are just like these super-undergrads who happen to get paid, right? How did they manage to fool every university in the country into paying them to take classes? And why have the small undergrad teaching colleges been able to see through their elaborate ruse? Wait, it’s on the tip of our tongue…eight-letter word, starts with “r”, ends with “search”…
AAIO, your post inadvertantly points out the difficulty I am have as a “preprofessional” Master’s student when it comes to framing the strike. With us research-free Master’s students, I have a hard time finding a good way to talk my peers into supporting this strike… to them (and often myself) I feel like I’m just getting a really, really, really well-paying part-time job. I can talk about supporting the Union and PhD students and others who might need it more, but I pretty much AM just a super-undergrad with the best work-study position in the world. That said, I won’t be holding class on Thursday and will take a picket shift like everyone else.
posted by GEO-graphic on March 22nd, 2005 at 12:38 pmHa! I used to hang out with Nolan all the time…and we disagreed on just about everything. If his point were that in the past, the GEO has made a few demands that were unrealistic (though perhaps only for bargaining position; I don’t know), he might be OK.
But you’re right — anyone who confuses the full 4-7 year role of PhD-level grad students with simply being a GSI is talking out of his or her ass. Having known several grad students doing research, I tired of their constant response, “I’ve got some data to crunch man; the beer has to wait.” Bummer for them (and me, when it’s my drinking buddies).
*chuckles* It’s just funny that Matt’s writing letters to the Daily about this.
posted by Evan on March 22nd, 2005 at 12:51 pmWhat an asshole. But what can you expect from most Law Students? Apparently, not much except an asshole attitude and no fucking clue.
Law school is three years. After 3 years they start out making $120,000. During the summer of their second year they do internships that pay over $2000 a week for what amounts to summer camp. That any law student could be critical of grad students is beyond me, but consider the source. A former Michigan undergrad turned law student. Blah.
posted by Mandrake on March 22nd, 2005 at 1:14 pmMandrake, I see your forces are being used for good. I wonder if any law or business students would be doing this if they were being paid like assistant professors well into their 30’s.
posted by peter on March 22nd, 2005 at 1:46 pmThat’s right. Since when have pre-professional students turned out any useful work on cross-cultural perceptions of peeing on Japanese Pop-Rocks?
posted by Murph on March 22nd, 2005 at 2:06 pmWell, at least I found it doesn’t kill you. And it was cola and pop rocks, not piss and pop rocks.
Truth is, I would defend graduate students any day. While I think the GEO goes overboard sometimes, I went to grad school at a university without a union - and they tried to screw us out of any benefit possible. Michigan grad students are the best in the country (and here I am speaking truthfully - they actually can get jobs) - is because they are better compensated for their work and don’t have to waste time taking on shitty side jobs like I did doing statistical analyses for professors in other departments just to make rent. The opportunity costs of going to grad school are extremely high - you give the most valuable years of your life on a gamble that in the end you’ll actually get a job, and in this day and age that is no guarantee. The least you can get is properly compensated for the fact that your research invades your life and consumes you and makes you bitter, miserable, and jaded like me.
But for a Law student to criticize graduate students - yeah, I get pissed at that. Because they simply don’t understand that grad school isn’t a walk in the park. I mean Greenway.
posted by Mandrake on March 22nd, 2005 at 2:19 pmmandrake, peter, and murph- you have just collectively made my afternoon.
posted by Joy on March 22nd, 2005 at 2:56 pmMandrake, excellent post. I too was a grad student at a non-union university. I’d just started going into my degree after three years spent outside academia, and while it seemed like a pretty sweet deal to me (they PAY you to take classes??), I was in my early twenties, healthy, and without a spouse or dependents. Hearing some of the shit my fellow students WITH spouses or dependents went through (especially the PhD students, whose workload was considerable greater) converted me to instinctive solidarity with grad student union movements. It’s especially irksome when so much of the teaching workload falls on grad students, either as GSIs (I was a TA for two years) or “lecturers” (I was an assistant lecturer for a year until the University President decided we didn’t need an extensive “World Civilizations” program and did need a parking lot–and this was Akron, not Ann Arbor). They’re not supposed to get paid for “studying,” but they’re badly paid for the stuff they end up doing, at least in my experience. I’m not sure what the situation is at Michigan, but reading some of these comments inclines me towards the belief that it ain’t all that much different.
Glad to see the greenway went down–for now.
posted by Lazaro on March 22nd, 2005 at 4:03 pmit is quite apparent from reading your posts that you are obviously bitter and miserable…it wasnt necessary to share. admit…
every time i read the posts now on aaio…its has become so predictable..blah blah this situation is shitty..blah blah…this town sucks…everyone i know and everything i do is bullshit..
anyone else here sick of this solanaceous fleshy forked herb?
im not saying hes not intelligent or sometimes witty…but this act has gotten old.
in fact…thats what he is. old crotchety toothless man, drinking jack daniels out of the bottle…pissing about the lousy state of the world. sheesh.
posted by saa on March 22nd, 2005 at 4:32 pmI’m surprised someone as apparently dumb as you even knows what the word solanaceous means. You planning on taking the LSAT, Saa? Good luck!
And I’ll let you know that I only drink rain water, distilled water, and pure grain alcohol.
posted by DrMandrake on March 22nd, 2005 at 7:44 pmI hear that once you’re in grad school, you’re carried about on a gilded litter! And that you’re given thousands of dollars in free paté and truffles! And that the entire time you’re in grad school, you only drink champagne!
posted by js on March 22nd, 2005 at 8:58 pmA number of PhD students I talked to today were especially pleased by the letter in the Daily to the effect that GSIships were a privilege enjoyed by grad students looking to enrich their educational experience. This of course is true - all of the GSIs I know would rather spend 30 hrs/wk grading than be on fellowship . . .
posted by Nick on March 22nd, 2005 at 9:37 pmugh nolan was my apartment building’s manager a couple of years ago. whata lazy punkass.
posted by Anonymous on March 22nd, 2005 at 11:19 pmI’m a law student here, and please, do not consider Nolan representative. He is a pompous ass-clown, the President of the Federalist Society — the wingnut Right-wing legal society, whose members get plum jobs as judges or in the DOJ Office of Legal Counsel where they can write spiffy little memos about how Torture is hunky-dory!
Most of us law students are actually liberals, despite undergoing this dehumanizing bootcamp that is 1L year…
posted by J on March 22nd, 2005 at 11:42 pmI don’t think that Nolan being “conservative” (though small-f federalist = textualist, not “conservative” - see 1L Con Law, and the cap-F Federalists take no political position, and is just as libertarian as conservative) has as much to do with his Daily letter as does the fact that he is a “pompous ass-clown,” something we agree on.
Also, Federalists are no more “wingnut” than are ACS members, depending on your position. Nothing wrong with a little tolerance of others - diversity and all, you know?
Furthermore, Federalists getting plum jobs as judges or in the OLC, well, that kinda depends on who’s doing the hiring, right? Now it happens that there’s an administration that’s more in line with the FedSoc. You think Federalists got plum jobs 6 years ago just for paying their $5/semester dues, or will when Hillary! is president? Sign me up.
posted by Jason on March 23rd, 2005 at 12:18 amFact is, some of Nolan’s classmates are GSIs and are getting paid to go to law school. So from that point of view, his argument makes sense.
Of course, some PhD students here would not want Nolan’s fellow law students to be allowed to GSI. Because only Real Academic ™ students should be allowed to do that!
All graduate students are equal. It’s just that some are more equal than others. Right, Mandrake?
posted by Mr B Baggins on March 23rd, 2005 at 12:30 amBilbo, the question is which is closer to the norm: Nolan’s classmates who are GSIs or Mandrake’s friends?
Administration decides who are GSIs. Ask them who should be allowed.
posted by peter on March 23rd, 2005 at 12:57 amHelllllll, we have UROP now, we can get the undergrads to do research for us and pay for tuition, biatch.
Oh, wait, UROP students just do the shitty work that grad students and older undergrads don’t want to do. I think they had the UROP kid in my lab dust the place about three times after they drilled holes in the concrete for shelving and the place was covered. I kept apologizing to him. But hey, he got class credit.
posted by Jen on March 23rd, 2005 at 1:17 amJason — those are some hilarious notions you have about members of the FedSoc.
I missed the part in the Constitution which notes that the “power to set aside the law inheres in the President” (see OLC Torture Memo). Textualists, my ass.
As for the plum jobs — of course the biggest is Judicial Clerkships. The hiring there, obviously, is done by life-appointed judges, many of whom these days are submoronic goons & cronies of the Preznit (see the one chap who improperly practiced law in both Utah & DC, just to start with some blatantly unqualified individuals).
Anyhow, I just wanted to add a further knock on Nolan. Sure, the FedSoc, as an organization, takes no ‘official’ positions…but when everybody knows its bigwig members & sympathizers are goons like Bybee & the cowards in OLC…it says something to happily remain associated with them.
posted by J on March 23rd, 2005 at 1:36 amJ, I’m sure we could go back and forth to the great disinterest of probably just about everyone else here.
I’m with you on Nolan, though - knock away. “Pompous ass-clown” it is. How did this kid get 1000’s to vote for him at one point?
posted by Jason on March 23rd, 2005 at 2:14 amHobbit - Most law students do not go into academia so there is little point in having them get GSI experience, plus, for the most part, law students are idiots who can’t teach, have no soul, and know almost nothing except boring and useless facts no one on earth cares about. This may be better, however, than most grad students, who can’t dress properly, are extremely neurotic, and believe they know everything about a single topic that no one on earth cares about either. Perhaps the best thing would be for universities to require their PROFESSORS to TEACH.
Now this may be different for Law students GSIing Law School classes. But last time I checked the Law School didn’t have undergrads, so who can they teach? Each other? I say fine - let the bastards infect each other with their questionable morals and greediness.
Jen, In my lab, I have three UROP students who I have given pretty substantial research roles - they aren’t just dusting. But you’re right that this happens sometimes. UROPs have to start somewhere - first year undergrads don’t have the experience to design and carry out their own research projects, and need experience doing some of the more mundane aspects of research (i.e., coding data, learning how to use excel). I think the UROP offie should make itself more clear on what it expects from the grad students (and postdocs) who use them.
posted by DrMandrake on March 23rd, 2005 at 8:05 amJason- You mean “uninterest.” Disinterest implies neutrality. That’s why judges are supposed to be disintrested in the cases they see.
posted by js on March 23rd, 2005 at 9:30 amC’mon, a law student shouldn’t have to be copy-edited on law terms!
Apathy. It’s what’s for dinner.
posted by Dave on March 23rd, 2005 at 10:10 amhey jen, who are you?
posted by Anonymous on March 23rd, 2005 at 12:35 pmHi, ____, I’m Jen. Sorry, I prefer the “say who you think I am and I’ll tell you if you’re right game”. Or the “use detective work and figure it out from a previous post” game (Hi Brandon). There’s a reason I never really mention my major or any discerning details on this site - I like my internet anonymity, at least to a point. Work and home life seperate, that sort of thing.
Mandrake - Yeah, my UROP experience was rather decent due to the insanely cool professor. But from when I was in it 3-4 years ago and seeing kids in it now, there’s way too many who just fall through the cracks into horrible situations while the university can up it’s claim on how many undergrads are involved in research.
I’m not saying that Excel analyzation, etc., isn’t important. Hell, I spend a good number of hours just analyzing spreadsheet after spreadsheet for my class-credit-lab right now, and it’s necessary. That’s reasearch. As my lovely summer supervisor told me as we spent weeks figuring out why our electronics were fucked up, “50% of your research hours will just be spent making sure your experiments will work in the first place”. Or something along those lines.
But when you get to the point that you’re doing cleaning, or your grad student / professor just throws something at you and doesn’t stop to explain why you’re doing it… then you’ve got a problem in the program. And believe me, no one really wants to address it. They say they do, but as freshmen/sophomores, no one wants to question a professor, really.
Although those once-a-week meetings with the peer advisors were amazingly fruitful and enlightening.
…wait, I forgot sarcasm doesn’t come across on the internet when I don’t have my italics html. Even when they had the best intentions, those meetings were overwhelmingly a waste of my time.
posted by Jen on March 23rd, 2005 at 8:20 pmits. Not it’s. Damnit. I know better. Sorry.
posted by Jen on March 23rd, 2005 at 8:20 pmI don’t think grad students deserve anything. We should only give them just enough to ensure we can attract the best students who would otherwise go to an equally good school.
If child care is needed to attract a certain grad student, then it might be alright. However, I see nothing wrong with expecting them to keep their dicks in their pants or to avoid getting knocked up if they want to get a graduate degree. It’s called personal responsibility. If they have kids they might not be worth the trouble or they might be, but we shouldn’t give it out as a blanket benefit.
To all GSI’s out there: I want my money back you theives. If you don’t like your job, quit, but don’t take home a paycheck for teaching me when you don’t do it. Do you have any idea how expensive out of state tuition is? Give me a break.
posted by Bill Brasky on March 23rd, 2005 at 10:03 pmBill Brasky is a son of a bitch.
posted by Dale on March 23rd, 2005 at 10:24 pmWell, despite the tone, he’s got a point. If grad school is just about THE MOST optional life choice possible (don’t kid yourself if you think you REALLY need to spend your days researching pop rocks and primates), why are you attending it if you’ve got kids to feed? And why are you expecting the university to subsidize your dependants for your part time teaching job if you do? Seems like an understandable position, especially from the view of an undergrad.
posted by Anonymous on March 24th, 2005 at 12:10 amBill, what is your expected income when you leave the university?
posted by Peter on March 24th, 2005 at 1:23 amI’m glad someone finally said it. Well done, Bill.
And let the market determine GSI/GSRA pay and perks.
posted by Anonymous on March 24th, 2005 at 8:18 amExcellent letter to the editor in the Daily today, Peter. (I’m assuming it was you, yes? Since the email address matches?).
Anonymous people, if the GSIs striking bothers you SO much, why don’t you sign your posts?
posted by Zigs on March 24th, 2005 at 9:41 amI would like to chop off Bill Brasky’s testicles so that he can’t breed. Go fuck yourself, Bill. You’re arguments aren’t even worth responding to, and coming from me, that says a lot.
posted by DrMandrake on March 24th, 2005 at 9:53 amThank you. (signed and email given). And the sad thing is, I can’t go into a building today to grab a copy to love and call me own
posted by peter on March 24th, 2005 at 11:49 amPeter, check the outdoor boxes… there’s one outside the Student Publications Bldg. on Maynard and others at prominent street corners… State and North U? East U and South U? …they’re around.
posted by Brandon on March 24th, 2005 at 12:19 pmI am a professional school student, but since I am not in business or law, I don’t anticipate making the zillions that Matt Nolan will probably make. As a pro-school student in one of those fields that’s more of a calling than a moneymaker, I just wanted to remind everyone that not all of us will be swimming in cash when we graduate.
For some pro-schools (including mine), GSI-ships are a vital part of our aid package, and like PhD students, these details are settled before our arrival on campus. We cannot borrow $30k a year against future earnings because our future earnings will be a lot closer to those expected by PhDs than MBAs. In my field, I can expect to make mid-to-high-30s coming out, and be in the mid-70s in a decade. Hardly princely sums.
In addition, I have spent the last two years working on a NIH-funded research project. I have had two publications in peer-reviewed journals as a result of it. So please don’t tell me that I don’t do research.
Pro-schools are not all the same. Law school may be more like undergrad than grad school, but it seems to me that many of us in MPH, MSW, MPP, MPA, MUP, and other pro-school programs are a bit closer to the PhD student track than the JD student track, at least in terms of financial need and intellectual output. (Certainly not in terms of time commitment.)
Just wanted to stick up for the professional masters programs.
posted by Dan on March 24th, 2005 at 1:25 pmI have a few questions, and forgive me if they are dumb questions:
Without getting into a discussion of overpaid/underpaid GSI’s at UMich, is a GSI package used as a recruiting tool by the University? In other words, when you apply to 3 Grad. Schools, do all of them put together some sort of financial package that includes time as a GSI? Is your GSI package put together before you accept admission, or after?
If a University didn’t use GSI’s, and replaced them with lecturers, would that be seen as a bad thing for a student that is considering attending that University? In other words, if the GSI opportunity didn’t exist, would that be seen as a negative?
posted by todd on March 24th, 2005 at 1:36 pmIn my department, PhD students are usually offered guaranteed funding for 5 years when they are admitted. This involves a combination of GSIs, fellowships and research assistantships. Many prospective PhD students see it as a bad decision to go somewhere without guaranteed funding. If they got rid of GSIs, they would have to offer fewer of these packages.
posted by ann arbor is overrated on March 24th, 2005 at 1:40 pmAn acceptance without funding is the equivalent of saying “We like you here in one subsection of the department, but the whole department isn’t motivated enough to have you come here.”
posted by js on March 24th, 2005 at 2:07 pmIt usually happens when only a couple of the faculty are directly involved in the sort of research that you’ll be doing, and they don’t have enough pull to get what they want.
But yes, that’s why my father’s getting his doctorate at MSU instead of Syracuse— ‘Cuse accepted him, but could only provide partial funding. MSU gave him a free ride and a job.
(Now ‘Cuse has been upset and MSU is still goin’ strong!)
When I was applying to grad schools I gave a lot of weight to the funding packages — and I didn’t want to be forced to teach to support myself. And it worked out for me. That’s not always a choice in some fields of study. But either way, guaranteed funding is a big way a school is competitive in recruiting grad students.
posted by E on March 24th, 2005 at 2:13 pmJust wondering, is it too much to ask for GSI’s to be proficient in English and teaching skills before they start clammoring for money? I mean, if we are paying them for teaching (we’ll take this as a separate argument from research), shouldn’t they at least be able to teach? I have had precious few teachers who have actually been able to teach here, let alone GSIs. It sometimes seems as if they are just researchers that get asked, or paid to, teach a class.
posted by Dan on March 24th, 2005 at 2:25 pmThat’s what I thought JS. I just wasn’t sure.
Another dumb question,
If you already know what you are getting into before you come to UMich, is the University trying to “bait and switch” or something? Is the University not living up to what they are are telling you the GSI jobs entail, and the compensation that will be received for the work?
If this isn’t a case of bait and switch, then won’t market forces change the GSI compensation packages? Am I oversimplifying things?
posted by todd on March 24th, 2005 at 2:32 pmDan - MOST big tier-1 research universities like Michigan could care less how well its professors or grad students teach. Teaching is not how you get tenure, or how you get big government or industry grants. It is becoming rich and famous through your research.
Because undergraduates hardly ever even attend class and do so hung over anyway, they rarely vocalize their dissatisfaction with their educational experience. One of the reasons is because most undergrads don’t have anything else to compare it too, and besides that are too busy trying to get drunk and laid to worry much about the quality of their education. (Or maybe this was just me when I was in college). So if I’m a professor here - I probably wouldn’t worry much about my teaching and focus my efforts on my research.
The only solution I suggest is to go to a small liberal arts college where teaching is valued over research, but then you get professors who haven’t kept up much with the new findings in the field - and even there there is no guarantee of quality teachers, either.
posted by Mandrake on March 24th, 2005 at 2:54 pm“The only solution I suggest is to go to a small liberal arts college where teaching is valued over research”
Yeah, for those who can afford to, I guess. Even on the low end those things are often more than out-of-state public university tuition (well, except UM’s). Would you think that teaching quality at smaller public universities that are less research-based might be comparable, then (i.e. EMU, Grand Valley State, etc.)?
In any case, I’ve had many good, and a few really great, professors at two different major research universities. I almost always attended class, too. I wonder if the education truly would have been better at a smaller school with smaller classes (i.e. no lecture halls) and fewer GSIs, however. I have a few friends who did so and find the situation over here hard to believe.
I sometimes wonder why we just don’t have separate people teaching and doing research. Then each could focus on their specialty rather than being sometimes mediocre in one or the other. It seems like so often faculty don’t even want to teach and that students so often get stuck with half-hearted classes. Why even have undergrads at these research schools? Does the tuition really fund the research? The current structure of the University almost seems like a historical accident sometimes, with assorted actors and missions tenuously tied-together with some maize and blue ribbon and a big seal.
posted by Brandon on March 24th, 2005 at 5:23 pmIf you already know what you are getting into before you come to UMich, is the University trying to “bait and switch” or something? Is the University not living up to what they are are telling you the GSI jobs entail, and the compensation that will be received for the work?
Well, most letters say something like, “… your funding package consists of up to five full years of funding to be covered by a combination of teaching, assisting in research and fellowships in addition to a tuition waiver.”
In other words, most letters, unless you’ve received one of the Rackham fellowships (which is full funding for, I think, 3 years) are vague about what the composition will be. The lucky folks teach relatively little and cover most of the time by GSRAships and fellowships. The unlucky ones can teach up to 10 semesters. I was lucky, but it could easily have come out another way because I had just a verbal agreement with my prospective advisor. I almost turned down UM in favor of two schools that offered full five years of funding, one with no teaching, another with just three or so semesters, and no teaching during the first year, promised in writing (actually, ironically, the latter is where I work now, and our “union” is more ridiculous than GEO).
If this isn’t a case of bait and switch, then won’t market forces change the GSI compensation packages? Am I oversimplifying things?
You may be oversimplifying things a little, but most entering students are getting paid pretty much as much as they can get given their field and the level of competitiveness of their application — in other words, market forces determine where you get in, and that is at least to some degree correlated with how good or bad the funding package is and market forces also govern how good or bad the opportunities are across fields even within the same university (e.g., English versus computer science). The thing that makes it a bit of an oversimplification is that there may be just three people in the country doing what you want to do, and even *if* you get into all three programs, your choice is more limited than the set of all universities in the world. There are some nobel prize winners who work at so-so universities because of, for example, the climate — so you could get some stellar students going to a place like Arizona State and getting paid less than their UM counterparts.
posted by Anna on March 24th, 2005 at 6:56 pmDan, sorry about the broad generalization. It was mainly in response to Nolan as a law student. I am sure you understand the general point.
I was out on the picket line today. I loved talking to skeptics today who wanted to talk about the issues because I they were being honest. The thing that annoyed me were the people who called us robbers and then ran away. Although my favorite was the counter-demonstrator with the sign “when GSIs strike, the terrorists win.” I am not making this up.
posted by Peter on March 24th, 2005 at 8:07 pmIs the University not living up to what they are are telling you the GSI jobs entail, and the compensation that will be received for the work?
For example, this is *exactly* what the University tried to do when they first changed the perscription drug coverage mid-contract, and again last year when they tried to change our health coverage premiums mid-contract. This is also what the U would wind up doing if they had to rescind domestic partner benefits if lawsuits seeking to enforce prop 2 are successful. People accepted employment here based on existing policies of domestic partner benefit coverage–shouldn’t it be the university’s responsibility to make sure they continue to honor these promises (if they can)?
If this isn’t a case of bait and switch, then won’t market forces change the GSI compensation packages? Am I oversimplifying things?
I always have to laugh when I see people refer to “market forces.” If you don’t believe “market forces” are just code for “social action playing itself out in economic exchange” then you are missing the forest for the trees.
posted by Alex(andra) on March 24th, 2005 at 9:19 pmIn my department we use our five-year funding package aggressively to recruit grad students. We also guarantee that no more than six out of the ten semesters will be teaching, and the average is closer to only four out of ten.
This is from my view only, but I think good public universities like Wisconsin, Berkeley, and Virginia cannot compete as well with Michigan as they could in the past. Most of these places offer a few people good money and a lot of people little or no funding with a bunch of promises. So whatever you think about the elements of this particular GSI strike today, the five-year funding package has been a definite factor in keeping Michigan at or near the top of the lists of selective public universities despite our location which is a discouragement to a fairly large segment of any potential applicant pool. Let me qualify that I am speaking about what I know, which is the humanities departments within LSA.
posted by Matt on March 24th, 2005 at 9:29 pmTo my knowledge, the UM never puts any of the details of the health coverage in writing nor is it mentioned in the acceptance letter or any literature you recieve from the U before enrolling (and it is also almost never mentioned in detail in offers in the private realm, so no, changes are not really “bait and switch”, unless the student has throroughly researched them *before* accepting an offer of admission, and gotten some sort of committment from the University that the levels will not change even in the slightest during the 5-7 years the student is in school). I don’t think the University should be cutting health coverage, but to call it “bait-and-switch” isn’t fair.
posted by Anna on March 24th, 2005 at 10:02 pmErr… I meant “industry” not “private” in the above. At any rate, I’ve gotten a couple non-academic offers, as well as a couple academic offers and none have included very detailed information about the health package because they often change from year to year depending on what the company can negotiate with various health insurance carriers, like Blue Cross.
posted by Anna on March 24th, 2005 at 10:11 pmMandrake - watch that comment about undergrads.
The thing about undergrads - and most do go to classes, unless the lectures are so horrible it’s completely useless - is that usually they’ll only have that professor for one class, for one semester. Even if they’re horrible, that’s the only semester they’ll have to deal with it.
It’s a different problem if the professor is teaching a class in that student’s major, with the same result. No one wants to say anything bad (except on the anonymous scantron forms) about a professor who is going to most likely have that student again, who may be needed to write a letter of recommendation for that student, etc., etc., etc.
Someone once worked out how much is paid assuming a full time student, not including tuition and student fees, per class attended… and that figure was enough to get me into that seat, besides the learnin’. Which I did come here for.
Oddly enough, I think that same calculation was used in the argument against having snow days here.
If you want to go the roundabout way about it, bad professors/GSIs will turn a student off from a particular major, where they could have excelled, done research, become a grad, and gotten the research money back into the university. And believe me, I’ve seen that firsthand, especially if the student knows they’ll have to deal with that professor repeatedly throughout the course of the education. A love of the field doesn’t always cut it, or at the very least, they’ll major in it for undergrad but not think of staying for grad school.
Wait, that sounds familiar.
posted by Jen on March 24th, 2005 at 10:52 pmwait… that thing about undergrads actually going to classes doesn’t seem to correspond with my experience here.
I have a class of 20 people. I’ve told them that coming to class is their responsibility, that their participation grade won’t be based on attendance but on actual participation. I never lower anyone’s grade because of not coming to class because I believe that when you’re in college you are (or should be) wise and responsible enough to know if you can afford to miss 1, 2 or 10 classes. that’s the way my professors treated me: like an adult.
the class is not really early in the morning or too boring (at least that’s what I’ve gathered from the anonymous mid-term evaluations my students filled)
and yet on an average day I get 11 to 13 people in class (and most of those missing students should actually be in class trying to get better grades and learn)
I don’t know if I’m missing something here…
posted by espanolxfavor on March 24th, 2005 at 11:53 pmI’ve got a class of about 20 students, and maybe 1-2 max. are missing any given week. Maybe it depends on the subject matter… the people in my class seem to generally really take an interest in the issues at hand, that’s why they enrolled (it doesn’t fufill any core requirements, which may help).
posted by Brandon on March 25th, 2005 at 12:32 amAs a resident old fart, I guess I’d just add to what Anna said in that even in the “real world” you don’t always know exactly what you are getting into when you accept a new job. To the extent there is competition for your services (or in the academic case, your knowledge/ranking/whatever as a student), then it’s to your advantage. You might have more power in negotiating a job offer than you do in accepting a grad school offer, but you still obviously have some say.
I never went to grad school, like most of the population, but my own timid opinion is that if you are there and able to make it work, you should probably feel pretty fortunate. I don’t make a whole lot of money in the “real world” at what I do, but I’m still grateful for it. Most of y’all grads will do really well but you just gotta get through the rough spots. (And what is school but a rough spot?)
This here encouraging commentary brought to you by Disillusioned Thirtysomething Bachelor Degreed Old Fogeys Inc.
posted by Dave on March 25th, 2005 at 2:11 amI know this is jumping back a while but . . .
posted by Dan on March 25th, 2005 at 5:24 amThere are great professors, but almost all of the ones I’ve encountered so far have been in engineering. The scary thing is, they like their jobs and can connect to the students (it seems like some sort of paradox . . .)
You’ll get good professors and bad professors anywhere you go. Lots of people who go to small teaching schools do it because they love to teach, but lots also go there because they couldn’t get the jobs they really wanted — at research universities. The latter are the worst of all worlds, and there are plenty of them at the Amhersts, Lafayettes, Wesleyans, and Gettysburgs of the world.
posted by Anna on March 25th, 2005 at 9:09 amAs for teaching quality at the University of Michigan, GEO has consistently pushing for more training. In the 2003 contract cycle, GEO was asking for a 3 week pedagogy course before a GSI taught their first semester. The only reason that the pedagogy training is what it is today (varies by department) is because of GEO. If the U had their way, GSIs would be thrown into classrooms “cold.” (which is the way it used to be.)
As for pay for GSIs, a calculation of how much a student pays for a class, multiplied by the number of students, minus GSI pay, will show that truly the administration of the university is much more valuable than teaching.
posted by Mark on March 25th, 2005 at 9:28 amAlex (andra)
I guess that I should be more clear. What I mean by “market forces” is: if the grad students are getting the short end of the stick, or the fine print in their offered aid package simply isn’t there…..isn’t the word going to get out? Won’t UMich lose potential students as a result? And if this happens, aren’t the professors more likely to make a stink than the students?…..that is, they are loosing the blue-chip students because they aren’t offering enough, and that is weakening thier department?
I do believe that market forces is code for “social action playing itself out in economic exchange”. That’s the point of my question. Won’t the smart grad kids and the research that they produce turn UMich down if their packages don’t match up with other grad schools? It’s not like people involved in a single field don’t talk.
posted by todd on March 25th, 2005 at 9:33 amAlong with words like “hegemony” and “patriarchy” comments like Alexandra’s are the type that will make me leave a party.
Anyway, Todd, to give you my 2 cents worth of answer to your question about market forces encouraging students to go elsewhere and professors steping in — yes, that happens. In my old UM department, one of our main competitors offered no teaching during the first year and five years of funding with limited teaching. The faculty at UM lost or almost lost a couple students and started screaming bloody murder. The next year the funding plan was changed to try to distribute the teaching more fairly so that everyone had to teach the same number of semesters — which lowered the teaching load for a lot of students while not raising it that much for the others. So yes, market forces encourage faculty to step in and correct funding issues.
posted by Anna on March 25th, 2005 at 9:43 amOh, and there’s another check and balance on the system that most grad students don’t know about — each department undergoes external review every X number of years (I believe 10) and the external committee reports back to the university administration. The external committe reports on things like faculty mentoring quality, available resources, support for junior faculty, graduate student quality, funding for students, teaching load, salaries, and almost every other aspect of the department. They tell the administration where the department stands relative to other departments, and universities usually strive to fix problems so that the reviews are positive because it ups the standing of the university. That way, major problems are detected and fixed — that was another impetus for the change in funding practices in my UM department. Faculty and administration take the external review very, very seriously. External funding agencies take it very seriously, too (which makes UM take it even more seriously) — on every grant the environment you’re working in gets ranked by the reviewers as “very supportive” to “not supportive” — when “not supportive” it is very difficult to get grants, which is something that is important to the UM.
posted by Anna on March 25th, 2005 at 9:48 amOops, losing. not loosing. I suck.
posted by todd on March 25th, 2005 at 9:55 amMark -
All the training in the world won’t matter if the GSIs don’t really care, or consider themselves above the students. In some classes having more training may help with GSIs, sure. However, most of the ones who just don’t know enough about the teaching process at least make an effort, and the students do notice and still do learn. I’ve had plenty of classes with first-year GSIs, and some were remarkable just in the fact that they made an effort - if the lecture was unclear, they’d meet with the students. They would figure out the homework on their own, and see where we might slip up and what could be mentioned in class/discussion that would help. They are appreciated, and believe me, I let someone know it when the semester is out.
I’m not going to get into GEO negotations, because I don’t really know about them, nor do I really care at the moment. I don’t know what’s offered at other universities; I don’t know how the grad student process works above this specific university. I think that the University does have an obligation to be a leader in good employee/employer relations, especially in this day and age when health care isn’t really considered a basic right by employers or the government anymore. I don’t know anything in detail, however.
As for the classes where students don’t show up: there’s one class I do not attend on a regular basis. Why? Because I don’t need to. The class was an elective for me, and while the subject itself is still interesting, the lectures are almost demeaning in the elementary nature of it. This is most likely my fault - I picked a lower level class because it’s in a subject I’ve never formally been educated in. But I produce the papers and do the research on my own, using the suggested readings as a guide, and get far more out of it than the one hour a week… Although I could get by doing a fraction of the outside research I do. I usually just leave frustrated because the same elementary point of the day has been brought up three times as “reinforcement” in the lecture, once asked at the class directly for “participation”, and twice more in the dicussion where the GSI does nothing more than repeat the exact outline that was brought up in lecture, with no further elaboration.
Anyhow, plenty of other people don’t have such elaborate reasoning for missing class - it’s probably just that they can get by fine without showing up, and it’s effort. Don’t fret about it - it’ll show up in the grades, and grading on participation-not-attendance is the best way to go, as long as you don’t knock out someone who’s just shy in the process.
posted by Jen on March 25th, 2005 at 10:20 amI just had an argument with a friend who is against GEO about the GEO strike yesterday. Being a bad debater, I would appreciate some response to refute his arguments (which I think are generally the arguments of many who are against the strike):
posted by Salee on March 25th, 2005 at 1:39 pm1. The university is undergoing a budget cut, and giving more money to the GSIs would mean less budget allocation in other areas of greater importance,which includes a higher pay for professors and lecturers (he supports LEO, so he thinks that more money to GSIs means less to lecturers).
2. In connection to no. 1, undergrads would have to incur higher tution to cover the higher cost.
3. GSIs are getting free tuition. Add that tuition waiver with the monthly income, then it’s acceptable pay if not good enough.
4. It is a process that GSIs have to go through before becoming professors or before getting their PHDs. And besides, they are getting invaluable experience and education in return. Compared to their peers outside school who may have higher pays, the GSIs are getting a degree at the end of their studies here.
5. The same argument you have heard in the Letters to Mich. Daily: “no matter what they say, they are still students”.
Thanks.
And also,
posted by Salee on March 25th, 2005 at 2:01 pm6. U of M GSIs are better paid than their counterparts in other universities (an article in the Daily reported that GSIs in U of Wisconsin are getting a third of the GSIs here). So which universities, excluding the private ones, are GSIs getting better offers?
Well, his points aren’t all completely wrong. The university is undergoing a massive budget cut. That’s why I wasn’t in favor of the strike. Anyone who supports LEO but not GEO, though, is probably unclear on the role of research at a research university. As for the tuition waiver, remember that this is a lot smaller for PhD candidates. And as for us being students, it depends on what you think it means to be a student. Classes are usually finished for a PhD student less than halfway into the program.
posted by ann arbor is overrated on March 25th, 2005 at 2:06 pmSalee,
1) You are right in that the money for raises has to come out of somewhere — not necessarily faculty or lecturer salaries, but it’s got to come from some part of the budget.
2) Public versus private has nothing to do with anything. It’s fair to compare UM grad students to those at private schools (and thus compare stipends) because the UM competes with private schools for talent (facutly and grad student and undergraduate).
3) In principle, grad students could get Ph.Ds without ever having taught a class — it has nothing to do with the degree at all (which is a *research* degree), though you are correct that it would be hard to get a job without at least two semesters of teaching — but most teach more than that. That being said, undergrads at UM are benefitting from the money spent on educating Ph.D. students (now professors) by others 10-30 years ago. If you think of it that way, of course you should be paying for GSIs because it’s part of our educational system and without them, it can’t exist.
posted by Anna on March 25th, 2005 at 2:13 pmResponses for your anti-GEO buddy:
1. I taught a 70 student lecture last year. I estimate the school took in $200,000. I got paid $7,000 for the term to teach it. I don’t think asking $7,500 for the term (which is what GEO is arguing for) is unreasonable. The budget cut argument is smoke and mirrors.
2. Split my $500 cost of living increase (not a raise) over 70 students. Yep. You’d pay an extra $7 for each class. Thirty bucks a term. That would suck.
3. Free tuition. OK, I’ll grant you that for the first year or two, we take classes. After that, PhD students rarely take classes. The school covers our tuition of $8000 per year as candidates. But in reality, that $8000 class is an independent study, doing research.
4. Teaching has NO (repeat NO!) relevance on whether or not you get a PhD. In fact, time teaching slows the progress. Most, if not all PhD’s, teach just to pay the bills. If we could, we’d love to be on fellowship doing only research.
5. This is the biggest point of contention in the legal system right now. Students at Columbia (I think, maybe it was Brown or Penn, can’t remember), wanted to be recognized as workers, not students. The courts said that the GSI was financial aid, and that GSI’s aren’t workers, but students. Getting a PhD is nothing like undergrad or professional school. If you could get the degree just by going to classes for 4 more years, taking a few tests, and teaching a class, hell I’d sign up for two. The fact of the matter is that grad students are cheap labor for research and teaching (see number 1).
After earning our undergraduate degrees at highly selective universities, and making countless sacrifices in terms of family and lifestyle (see Bill Brasky’s post), many of us in grad school just want to make enough money to live for five years at a level slightly below the average for a high school dropout.
Last point. GEO and grad students in general are not whining. When a faculty member wants a raise, he’ll go and get other job offers and have the university match. As grad students, our bargaining chip is our collective power. Individually, we cannot say, “give me $500 or I’m out.” As a group, we can do this, and that is how we successfully get a good contract. The University has offered up a 2% wage increase when inflation is looming on the horizon. Mary Sue’s sallary is a helluvalot more than a 2% increase over Lee Bollinger’s old salary. You tell me who’s greedy.
posted by Matt on March 25th, 2005 at 2:29 pmA comment about the following statement posted by Bill Brasky…”I see nothing wrong with expecting them [grad students] to keep their dicks in their pants or to avoid getting knocked up if they want to get a graduate degree. It’s called personal responsibility.”
Obviously, this moron has no understanding that graduate students often are at very different points in their lives than undergrads. I was married and had 3 kids and worked in the corporate world for 15 years before going back to school. I didn’t anticipate going back to school until I lost my well-paying job under the Bush Admin and then could not find another job. Would I be better off to go on public assistance rather than trying to make myself more marketable? Additionally, I find it unacceptable that single grad students (like myself) with children qualify for food stamps and other government aid. The University should be ashamed of this little bit of information.
As a Ph.D. student, I work full time between my graduate studies and my teaching (60+ hours/week). And yes, GSI positions are a recruiting tool for universities. If undergrad students here at U of M prefer the University to lose it’s position as one of the top public universities in the U.S., then by all means, quit recruiting top grad applicants. Let prospective grad students go to other schools. You can then watch U of M’s prestige take a nosedive, along with private and public funding, quality of professors, etc.
We’re asking for a LIVING WAGE. That means I can feed my kids, pay my rent and other bills, clothe myself and my children, and have a bit of money left over for emergencies. As it stands, I must take out student loans simply to subsist at a very basic level. Even without children, $14,000/year ain’t a lot of money. Certainly not a boatload.
posted by Kay Kay on March 25th, 2005 at 2:40 pm70 students? Good lord. What class was it, and is this a common class size for a GSI to handle?
Another question: does a lecturer get more or less than $7K per class taught?
posted by todd on March 25th, 2005 at 2:42 pmI agree with a lot of what you said, Kay Kay, but I, too have always wondered whether it’s the UM’s responsibility to provide for graduate students’ families. I put off child-bearing because I didn’t want to have kids until I was in a position to do so financially. If I had had children, I’m pretty sure that I wouldn’t have opted to go to grad school. Grad school’s a choice, and the unfortunate truth is that we don’t always get to do whatever we want to do completely unfettered by practical constraints. On the other hand, there’s a societal problem that forces the decision between career and children on women more often than it does men. But I’m not sure that’s really a problem to be solved at the UM level.
posted by Anna on March 25th, 2005 at 2:48 pmTodd,
I have taught 3 semesters. My first semester I had 75 students, the second I had 50 students and the third (currently) I have 70 students. The only reason I had 50 for the second semester is because the course was an Upper Level Writing Requirement which required more time for grading. Oh yeah, and this was for a .50 fraction. I don’t know about lower or higher fractions and their number of students.
As for having children, many women in the academy and the corporate world postpone or forego having children because of opinions such as it’s not the university’s (or the corporation’s) responsibility to provide for the employee’s children. Remember, we as grad students are academic and research capital for the University. Should we not be compensated for that? Don’t most people with jobs receive compensation for their work, intellectual contributions, research, etc.? Most of those people earn enough money to provide for life’s basic needs, including feeding and clothing children. Most human beings do actually pro-create.
posted by Kay Kay on March 25th, 2005 at 3:04 pmI’m glad you’re back, Anna- I’ve missed your posts. Your point about careers vs. children highlights for me what is so difficult about a lot of the sticking points in GEO negotiations. Living wages, affordable health care, affordable child care, and non-discrimination for non-citizens and non-heterosexuals are enormous, difficult issues on the national stage. It can be argued that because these are societal problems, it’s not UM’s role to address them for GEO employees. It can also be argued that UM has more power than many public and private employers in addressing these issues for their employees, and that by doing so, they may push things forward in the society at large. I’m conflicted about it.
posted by Joy on March 25th, 2005 at 3:08 pmThanks, Joy — I’m conflicted, too, and I might even be persuadable, especially as I watch friends and colleagues with fertility problems post-tenure.
However, I’m not pursuaded by arguments like Kay Kay’s, and in fact, I think it’s arguments like that that really do us all a disservice.
Kay Kay — School is school, work is work — there’s a difference. GSIs perform a service, but things could be restructured in such a way that the university could do without them (really, I know that’s not what GEO says, but it could, and many schools do). Furthermore, what people choose to do with their money is up to them — if you want to spend it on your children, fine, but you could have also taken a ‘real’ job instead of going to grad school — I do not accept that graduate school is the alternative to being on welfare.
It happens to be that corporate jobs generally pay more than teaching stipends. That’s not because women (or anyone) *need the money* for *raising kids* — it’s because that’s what the company is willing to pay for the work that is done. Jobs like social-work don’t pay very well, but lots of people enjoy doing social work and therefore choose to do it. If lifestyle is important to you, and you want your life’s work to be fulfilling, and you find social work to be fulfilling, by all means, become a social worker. But recognise that it’s a choice and it isn’t as well-paid as being a corporate attorney. Same goes for deciding to get more education. It’s a lifestyle choice.
posted by Anna on March 25th, 2005 at 3:24 pmYou all are missing a point. You are graduate students AND teachers of record and employees of the University. They are not mutually exclusive.
The assistantship isn’t a gift. Its a JOB. A JOB they pay less qualified people twice as much to do at a community college, and six times as much to a professor to do half ass…if you could ever get a professor anywhere near an undergrad.
Your university, like EVERY university, brings in just exactly as many PhD candidates as they have undergrad intro sections to teach or research they need done CHEAP. Coming in the door they aren’t looking at you as STUDENTS, they are looking at you as CHEAP HELP.
They are essentially outsourcing what used to be full time professorships to GTAs and post docs…do you honestly think the academic world can support Xthousand PhDs in English per year?
The degree is just the BAIT to get grad students o TEACH. So if the U looks at you first as LABOR..then YOU need to look at yourselves first as LABOR.
And compared to ther equally or less qualified people doing the same work? GTA’s are screwed.
And don’t mention the tuition waver…it doesn’t cost the U a fricking CENT. Without grad classes, they can’t call themselves a graduate research institution.
So ten master’s degree candidates sit in the class and pay the salary of the prof…and four GTAs take up the empty chairs. The class would run anyway without them…the tuition waver is a red herring..
Screw how much you are being personally compensated and look at HOW MUCH MONEY YOu ARE BRINGING IN (your students tuition dollars + fraction of per cap x the number of students you have) versus what you actually COST the University…which after subtracting the state per cap? Is peanuts.
posted by Nancy Jowske on March 25th, 2005 at 3:47 pm“JOB they pay less qualified people twice as much to do at a community college”
I’m not sure what the pay is there, but don’t most community college teachers have a Master’s? I know I don’t.
“Coming in the door they aren’t looking at you as STUDENTS, they are looking at you as CHEAP HELP.”
I wish they were, then I could get a GSI job every sememster to pay for tuition and living expenses!
So angry…
posted by Brandon on March 25th, 2005 at 4:12 pmHoly hell, Nancy, I hope you aren’t a product of UM.
posted by Anna on March 25th, 2005 at 4:41 pm“Don’t most people with jobs receive compensation for their work, intellectual contributions, research, etc.?”
Man, you people need to get out of academia and into the real world, where questions like that can evoke laughter or tears or both.
Look, I know being a grad student can be very stressful, but as Anna said, it’s a choice one makes to be in grad school. And listening to people piss and moan about how awful it is and how the university is acting unfair and wah-wah-wah has gotten exceedingly tiresome.
Frankly, I find the whole idea of a grad student union pretty ridiculous to begin with, but not as ridiculous as the GEO’s current strike platform. If you ask me (and yeah, I know no one did), it displays a breathtaking childishness and total ignorance of even basic economics.
I’m sure I’ll take a lot of shit for posting this, but I felt like someone needed to say GROW UP. Everyone has a personal hard luck story but you just deal with it as best you can and move on, not demand of the world either what it doesn’t owe you or can’t give you or both.
This is the less polite version of my earlier post. Maybe I’m just in a grouchy mood, although I shouldn’t be since it’s Friday. Happy hour at the Earle, anyone? A plate of mussels for $2.50. I am so there.
posted by Dave on March 25th, 2005 at 4:44 pmI have lived and worked in the real world, and I got compensated for the work I did then. I got paid pretty well, actually. Perhaps Anna is right, I could have gotten a job rather than go to grad school. I actually looked for work for over a year before I made the decision to return to school. While looking I worked three part-time rather low paying jobs to make ends meet.
I also resent being portrayed as a cry-baby. I love what I’m doing. I love teaching and getting to come to grad school in a subject area I really love. I appreciate being able to be a GSI, but I think what I’m doing is very valuable and deserves adequate compensation. The U could hire PhDs to do our jobs, but I suspect the U would have to pay them considerably more than GSI wages. Requesting an adequate living wage isn’t whining. It’s requesting an adequate living wage.
posted by Kay Kay on March 25th, 2005 at 5:27 pmThe UM could also get rid of discussion sections almost all-together, as my current university has done. The students hate them, they are largely unnecessary, and serve an administrative purpose only most of the time. Yes, for lack of anything better to do, people have started covering material during sections, but that doesn’t have to be the case. The reason discussion sections *should* exist is to a) give grad students teaching experience, b) serve as a funding mechanism — both of which are worthwhile (in my opinion) and which benefit the grad students more than the undergrads. How could one teach a big lecture course without discussion sections? Easy. Hire one or two readers who never meet with students except during occasional office hours. The only area in which the UM might be forced to hire more faculty is to cover writing/ECB, which incidentally is highly disfunctional, ineffective, and exists largely to employ graduate students.
Sorry, I am getting grumpy too. I was sick of grad student whining when I WAS a grad student, and it’s even more gauling now that I can see the administration/facutly side of things.
posted by Anna on March 25th, 2005 at 6:26 pmer, dysfunctional
posted by Anna on March 25th, 2005 at 6:32 pmhow about er, galling.
sorry, couldn’t resist!
i’m not a GSI right now, but i have been, 5 times. i think discussion sections actually serve a pedagogical purpose. there’s value in discussion. learning happens through engagement with ideas, and through grappling with those ideas.
think about the training people go through to be elementary/middle/high school teachers… and lots of those people STILL aren’t great teachers (though lots of them are!). now think about the training GSIs get to be teachers… um, almost nothing. and professors? well, they used to be grad students, so same deal, or even worse, as i think training has improved a great deal. it could be even better. but that would involve the university actually spending money to train us.
i would love to get more training, but frankly, i would also love to have better benefits and compensation. and to anyone who says “well, so would a lot of people”, i reply: GO ORGANIZE. and to anyone who says “GSIs at Michigan get paid better than most other schools”, i reply: BECAUSE WE HAVE BEEN ORGANIZED FOR 30 YEARS.
we ARE cheap labor for the university. we ARE being prepared for academic careers, whether that is our chosen career path or not. we ARE learning to be teachers while we lead discussion sessions and labs. many, many of us like teaching, like working with undergraduates, and put a hell of a lot of time into our teaching responsibilities.
are we fortunate to have the opportunity to make a wage teaching? yes. but we are fortunate BECAUSE GEO has been our collective voice for the past 30 voice, not out of the goodwill of the university.
and for those people who include our ‘tuition waiver’ as part of our compensation, i’m sorry but that’s idiotic. and besides, you can’t eat a tuition waiver.
i agree with nancy all the way.
-yael
posted by yael on March 25th, 2005 at 7:45 pm“and for those people who include our ‘tuition waiver’ as part of our compensation, i’m sorry but that’s idiotic. and besides, you can’t eat a tuition waiver.”
No you can’t eat it, but it’s that much less debt I have to go into. I support GEO and participated in the walkout, but I am tired of everyone completely discounting the tuition waiver. For me this is BY FAR the best benefit I receive from this job. If some of you PhDs take this completely for granted and feel entitled to free tuition for working a part-time job, then go ahead. I’m not in this for the living expenses, I’m in this to get through school without adding much to the hefty debt I accumulated as an undergrad. I could pay for rent with work-study (though this certainly pays better) like I did last semester and probably will again next semester when I can’t get another GSI position.
posted by Brandon on March 25th, 2005 at 8:07 pmi think the outlook is different between doctoral and professional or masters students. we are in a long, long long long program living on $14000 per year for anywhere from 5-10 years. (i’ll be done in 6 + one semester! yay!). if i came into school expecting to bite the bullet, go into debt, and then found a GSI opportunity, i’m sure i would feel like you do: grateful and appreciative.
but the structure of doctoral education is different than professional education, and its aim is different as well. doctoral students are being trained to contribute to knowledge production. professional schools and masters programs do not have that focus. sure, some masters students, law students, etc, end up involved in research (usually because they want work/study jobs, which is great), but that isn’t the structure and purpose of those academic programs.
all that said… the reason GSI positions are well-paid and that we have tuition waivers at all is BECAUSE of GEO.
-yael
posted by yael on March 25th, 2005 at 9:00 pmMy point is, remember that we exist. Not everyone is a doctoral student… I largely supported this strike on faith that ya’ll really need what GEO’s asking, even though many of us master’s/professional students are doing just fine and are often just happy to be here.
posted by Brandon on March 25th, 2005 at 9:28 pmok, I have a question. I’m just asking for your opinion:
posted by Anonymous on March 25th, 2005 at 11:11 pmstudents skip class all the time for many different reasons: tiredness, lazyness, unableness or just by choice. so… why did so much of them yesterday went to class AND DECIDED to cross a picket line? a lot of them -when asked- replied: I’m sorry I have to get an A, I need to do my work, my grades are important…
ok, but why today? why not when you’re out partying or when you go to a concert or to a club?
it seems so inconsistent
I don’t know what you all think about this.
Brandon,
Just as you have a hard time with thinking of tuition waivers as benefits of employement gained in collective bargaining.
I have trouble with feeling like people are getting raises everytime tuition goes up.
I do want to highlight the diffence between benefits of employment with wages. They are different in significant ways.
Grad employee tuition is a shell game. One hand of the university administration giving the other had money for you, as an employee, to take classes. In 1998, Paul Courant showed GEO that tuition cost for grad employees didn’t matter to the university administration. It could be $100 or $100,000 dollars. (we propsed in 1996 that there be an employee tuition rate, to avoid the in-state/out-state and PhD/Masters divides.)
Also, the university has never stated that they would raise tuition rates to cover the GEO contract. (I believe that is a straw man fallacy: http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/straw-man.html)
I enjoy this discussion.
posted by Mark on March 25th, 2005 at 11:16 pmAnna,
From reading your various posts you seem to be a faculty in biosciences, and it is interesting to see your opinions on the role of grad students in research, and how grads should be funded. Do you really feel that teaching should be a funding mechanism? Do you use this to fund grad students in your lab? And, if so, why do you feel that is justified over paying grads off, say, your ro1 or some other grant?
posted by E on March 26th, 2005 at 9:30 amWell, I stepped clumsily into this argument a couple of years ago on AAIO, and have come to learn that fuzzy math seems to rule when discussions of the value of the tuition waiver. Personally, I just flip over to the on-line page that shows the cost for tuition for the various departments. UMich has already assigned a cost/value. It’s right there. AAIO has pointed out to me before that the in-state/out-state argument can be made for someone who has to live in Michigan for 4-7 years. I can’t say that I can argue with her point here.
What I can argue with the assertion that this tuition waiver somehow has no value. I can’t believe that you feel this way. Is it your belief that a University can run a PhD program with no money at all? There’s no overhead? The brilliant professors who attracted you to UMich in the first place draw no salary? The PhD programs don’t draw on the tremendous libraries and administrative infastructure?
And who spends the most time with UMich’s professors? Certainly not the undergrads. You are using University resources just as sure as the undergrads are.
I simply don’t believe that you think this way. This is theoretical rhetoric, and you are taking license. You can’t believe that a PhD program runs on fumes. And it IS a raise, btw, when tuition goes up. All of the overhead costs associated with the running of a PhD program have gone up.
You can argue all you want about the exact value of the PhD tuition waiver….but arguing that it has no value at all doesn’t work with anyone with either a calculator or a few fingers and toes.
posted by todd on March 26th, 2005 at 1:34 pmWell, if tuition increases are raises, did I take a huge pay cut when I became a candidate? Or is someone who passes quals and prelims early being financially penalized for their initiative? I certainly would never argue the waiver has no value, but assigning it the exact monetary value of the cost of tuition also leads to some strange conclusions.
posted by ann arbor is overrated on March 26th, 2005 at 2:06 pmAlso, when we spend time with professors we are (theoretically) collaborating with them on research just as their colleagues are, although perhaps needing more guidance.
posted by ann arbor is overrated on March 26th, 2005 at 2:07 pmAs I said, assigning a value proves difficult if you don’t want to use the UMich figure….and I’m not saying that you should use their figure.
Tuition rate hikes are raises only in the sense that they reflect the overhead associated with the PhD program. I would think that when a particular department assigns the cost of tuition per year for a PhD program, they arrive at the figure by looking at the average time that it takes for a candidate to make it through the program, and then find how much it costs UMich to get the candidate the degree. Divide by five (or whatever) and there you go. At least that’s how I would do it, although I’m obviously no accountant. If I were in charge of finances at Leopold Bros., we would have gone belly up years ago, so I’m probably not a real good authority here.
posted by todd on March 26th, 2005 at 2:21 pm“Pedagogical” — ugh, another word that will make me leave a party. Teaching people to teach at the college level is often a waste of time. It is *highly* discipline-specific and so training programs most often fail (e.g., ECB). Teaching, like research, best learned by doing.
E — I wasn’t necessarily talking about funding my own students — I was talking about universities as a whole, and in many disciplines grant money isn’t available or is very limited (e.g., art history, English, history, philosophy). I do fund students via grants, but only students from programs that need it because my work is inter-disciplinary and depending on department, some get university fellowships/teaching, others must be sponsored (too me-specific and complicated to get into).
In general, the graduate school puts together a package that assists students in getting a degree. That package consists of a tuition waiver, teaching and fellowships. Funding source in my lab (and I would say most labs) is relatively invisible. The students with NSF fellowships do the same thing as those I am funding, or who happen to be teaching at the time. It’s all just a way of getting all the students’ expenses covered.
Regardless, I think that it’s reasonable for students to be funded by teaching. The teaching they do (whether it’s largely administrative, grading, or whatever) does help defer the costs of educating undergraduates. I think this is win-win for everyone — the next generation of university teachers gets some experience, the undergraduates’ papers are graded, records are kept, my time is freed up so that I can, for example, mentor more graduate students, or spend more time with undergrads in and out of my laboratory.
To say that a school “needs” these teaching assistants is wrong. If you cut the number of graduate students and thus, the need for funding them, you can easily change things around so that graduate student teaching is not necessary. Instead of sitting on dissertation committees, I could spend the time grading papers and responding to emails asking “will that be on the test?” I don’t think that would be *good* but it could certainly be done.
Todd is right on all counts. Tuition covers things that allow grad students to be on campus. I would also add that the fact that grad students aren’t sitting in classes is accounted for by the drop to in-state tuition after one has achieved candidate status.
posted by Anna on March 26th, 2005 at 3:02 pmAAIO — You also get a stipend raise when you achieve candidacy, but you’re right, precandidates cost the university more. However, candidates have also gotten more than precandidates, because they’ve gotten M.S. or M. A. degrees for free, which is worth money in the marketplace should you choose to drop out after becoming a candidate. I would say it works out.
posted by Anna on March 26th, 2005 at 3:07 pmTodd -
One fact that is forgotten is that grad students have an important role in universities - getting grants.
When I was in graduate school, I and my grad student colleagues assisted my advisor in writing a number of grants. She couldn’t have done this alone, because it requires a shitload of work she was unwilling or unable to do, like extensive library research. Fortunately, we got all the grants, which, over the course of those years, amounted to well over several million dollars. Let’s set that at 2 million. Indirect costs at most institutions (this is the amount the university in general gets from that grant for infrastructure is about 50%, meaning the university received at least a million dollars based on our labor.
Tuition at the university was something like $20,000 for grad students. So for 4 years of tuition waver I cost the school $80,000. Add the stipend and it ends up being about $100,000. So the university gained $900,000 as a result of my labor. I don’t see this as a bad deal, from the perspective of the university.
These are parts of the argument that are often neglected in the discussion. Grad students do work that professors couldn’t do alone. Of course, I myself, without the intellect or clout of my advisor, could not get those grants alone. But please don’t act as if the university has grad students at a loss for them. Students run studies, write papers, help make the university a famous research institute, attracting more funding and resources. The tuition waver and stipend, along with the benefits of that piece of paper hanging on my fridge that says doctor of philosophy - a drop in the bucket.
Todd - imagine Leopold brother’s on a Saturday night with only Kristen working - no Gabe to help wash the glasses. Imagine the line that would form at the bar, and the frustrated customers who would leave and go elsewhere. Imagine the money you would lose when customers start going to ABC. Gabe is the equivalent of what grad students are to universities. And I imagine his cost (salary) is sustained mainly not through your generosity but through that of your tipping customers in the same way that universities are kept afloat not so much through grad tuition but the generosity of places like the National Science Foundation.
posted by DrMandrake on March 26th, 2005 at 3:12 pmMandrake,
To be absolutely clear, the only assertion that I have made is that I do not agree that the tuition waiver has no value.
I’m actually quite proud that my State tax dollars (we’re talking tens of thousands per year to Michigan) goes, in part, to grad students. I think that there isn’t a question that grad students bring an awful lot to the table. I am in no position to judge if they are being fairly compensated, and I want to be sure you get that.
In your discussion of grants, you’ll notice that in private practice the company you work for is the sole beneficiary of any grants that you obtain…and if you are lucky enough to be granted a patent for the work that you do, the company is also the one who reaps the financial rewards, not you. My brother has been the victim of a patent “windfall” to a company. He didn’t get a penny.
I don’t necessarily think that this if fair, but it’s not like this doesn’t happen in private practice, or in NGO’s and GO’s for that matter.
posted by todd on March 26th, 2005 at 3:30 pmI would entirely agree that the tuition waver has a real value. I take no issue with that. I don’t really take issue with anything you say, I just wanted to point out that it is not like grad students are a drain on the system, gobbling up resources through tuition wavers and providing no value in return. It is just that the value they provide is so invisible because of the fact that so much of what goes on financially is so opaque it would take friggin John Maynard Keyes to figure it out.
Yes, a university owns the fruits of my second favorite organ, too - so if I come up with a patent - which is doubtful - they reap the rewards. Those bastards! My response has been to kill those brain cells with alcohol to avoid any original ideas whatsoever - take THAT university! (My liver objects to this plan, but screw you liver - what have you done for ME lately?)
posted by DrMandrake on March 26th, 2005 at 3:47 pmTodd,
I didn’t mean to imply that graduate employee tuition waivers had no value. I meant to imply that the current provost of the univeristy argued successfully to GEO in 1998 that the value was arbitrary (meaning it could be $100 or $100,000) and didn’t matter to them, So it shouldn’t matter to us. (so we should just keep the system we have.)
Also of note is that there are something like 10,000 graduate students and 1600 graduate employees. (research assistants are not employees btw, according to the administration)
posted by Mark on March 27th, 2005 at 11:15 pmMandrake, I think you may be a rare exception. My grad students do not help with grant writing at all, and I was never asked to do grant writing by my advisor. I generated pilot data for several grants, but I got publications out of that (and then had access to the resources that the grants brought in so that I could keep doing my research). I could easily use less-expensive post-docs (yes, post-docs cost less) or lab techs if I needed help with generating pilot data, rather than grad students. The grad students, on the other hand, cost a lot of time (and in one case, heartache and aggravation), and I’ve written virtually all of their fellowship applications (which for 2 of 3 students were funded). In the future they’ll contribute more and more to intellectual life in my lab, but to say that they’re bringing in money is overstating things. The relationship you had with your advisor seems unusual to me, and she sounds a bit incompetent if she can’t get her own grant apps together. Anna
posted by Anna on March 28th, 2005 at 10:45 amNo. I know someone working in the sciences here who has written large parts of grant applications bringing in hundreds of thousands of dollars, and done data analysis and written articles in major journals with her advisor, both of which helped the advisor get tenure. The university is getting more out of my friend than she got from the university.
I don’t understand your assertion that one person should be able to get a grant application together — lots of grants I have applied for, have worked on, and have seen (particularly those getting government funding) require the efforts of several people to put it together.
posted by Dale on March 28th, 2005 at 11:01 amAnna - I don’t doubt you are right in certain cases. Grad students can be hit or miss - when they work out good - it’s great, but when they don’t, it can be costly in terms of time and money and sheer emotional exhaustion. You’re right about grad students being expensive - or any RA or undergrad who you have to train. How many times have a trained an undergraduate only for him or her to suddenly quit. Then I think, “Would I want to work for me?”
But in my case, my advisor was 74 years old, and so she couldn’t be running around the library and she had only a minimal understanding of computers to do lit searches.
I think it depends on the case. Either way, grant writing is a pain in the ass.
posted by Dr.Mandrake on March 28th, 2005 at 11:18 amDale — Depends on how senior you are — the junior faculty I know do everything themselves with co-investigators on the grant. For running around and to the library, I have undergrad RAs (what a waste of time for a grad student). I wouldn’t dream of having a grad student write portions of it because they a) don’t know what’s in my head WRT what I want to say in the grant and b) 1st and 2nd years haven’t yet acquired science-writing fluidity, and later grad students are busy with research. Junior faculty usually go a couple years without any students (obviously the year you get there, and sometimes it takes a year or two to recruit someone depending on how many you can admit), and that’s when you’re writing most of your grants anyway (after that it’s resubmissions and renewals). That’s the way all my apps have worked and that’s they way all my friends’ apps have worked. Even senior people don’t usually trust grad students with the actual writing of the grant, though my advisor did lean on me more to help with the putting together (running around getting signatures, getting articles together, making graphs of pilot data, etc. — but I saw that as being part of the team and I stood to benefit in the form of my GSRA and money for my research). Anna
posted by Anna on March 28th, 2005 at 12:46 pmJust out of curiousity, what is the current 9-month .5 FTE stipend at UM? NSF is now paying 25K/year (12 months; 20K 9 months), which I think is pretty good.
posted by Anna on March 28th, 2005 at 1:13 pmFall/Winter is about 14,000
posted by Dale on March 28th, 2005 at 3:09 pmIs that .5 or .4, and pre or post-candidate?
posted by Anna on March 28th, 2005 at 4:42 pm.5 pre.
posted by Dale on March 28th, 2005 at 7:37 pmAnna,
“Even senior people don’t usually trust grad students with the actual writing of the grant, though my advisor did lean on me more to help with the putting together (running around getting signatures, getting articles together, making graphs of pilot data, etc.”
You’ll never leave Ann Arbor. You fit in too, too well, dear. What with your advisor “leaning on you more.” We need more self-importance in this town.
What a post! Pure Ann Arbor. Pure puffery.
Xavier
posted by Anonymous on March 29th, 2005 at 10:47 amXavier - Don’t fuck with Anna. She’s a prof. here apparently and she’s been dead on in talking about all these issues. Just because you’re a peon doesn’t give you the right to mock those of us who are awesome. Mandrake.
posted by DrMandrake on March 29th, 2005 at 10:59 amMandrake,
Don’t fuck with her because she’s a prof. here? My God, you two live together, don’t you?
I mock you not, Awesome Mandrake; I’m just having a bit of fun. Your Dame Anna seems to have herself confused with someone important.
It’s a dreaded disease which afflicts many who live in Ann Arbor. It is most catching amongst folk like your Anna on whom Kings and Advisors do lean.
Xavier
posted by Anonymous on March 29th, 2005 at 11:18 amWhat I’m saying you swarmy tool is that she adds a perspective to this discussion that is missing - the one from the other side of the table. There is nothing wrong with having a bit o old fun - hell, I make fun of everyone, most often myself. But your making fun of that sentence isn’t making fun of anything - it just doesn’t make sense. So her advisor leaned on her more to write grants means she feels she’s self important which means she will stay in ann arbor? Explain.
posted by DrMandrake on March 29th, 2005 at 11:28 amM,
I love the “swarmy tool” part. That’s why you’re Awesome, Mandrake. So many keys, so few fingers.
Essplain a yoke? Surely U jest?
The Moment. Has. Passed.
Xavier
posted by Anonymous on March 29th, 2005 at 11:55 amToo. busy. masturbating.
posted by Anonymous on March 29th, 2005 at 12:01 pmAnna is *NOT* a prof here. She was once a grad student here and now is someplace else.
She and I clearly don’t agree on much. She doesn’t want to party with me and my discussion of hegemony, patriarchy, or the social construction of economic markets. I don’t want to party with her positivstic worldview, her conservatism, or her supercilious comments about how it is “in the real world” (where, incidentally, I’ve probably spent more time than her).
But, she in entitled to her opinion, and it’s one that can’t (and shouldn’t) be dismissed as mere Ann Arbor puffery.
posted by Alex(andra) on March 29th, 2005 at 1:12 pmFair enough. I only hope when I am someplace else, I’ll be doing things other than posting on AAiO! Like enjoying myself!
posted by DrMandrake on March 29th, 2005 at 4:43 pmAlex(andra):
Ann Arbor Puffery can never be dubbed “mere.” It’s full-blown and overflowing. It’s simply bellicose.
Anna’s description of how other grad. students are normally treated in a situation, and how she was “leaned upon” by her advisor was just too perfect to pass up. Classic, classic Ann Arboritis Overratis.
All hegemony aside.
Xavier
posted by Anonymous on March 29th, 2005 at 5:06 pmI tend to leave the party when “identity” or “Other(ing)” come up.
la vie academe,
posted by Brandon on March 29th, 2005 at 10:32 pmErr… sorry I checked out for a while. Thanks for defending my honor, Mandrake, and Alexandra is correct on both counts — I got my degree at UM and I am a prof elsewhere and I also don’t want to party with her. I’m liberal about many things, but PC bullshit is so 1994. From what I gather, Alexandra’s “real world” work has consisted of working in non-profits (no doubt fighting patriarchy).
And Xavier, is it really self-aggrandizing to say that my advisor leaned on me for article searches and making graphs? My poorly-articulated point was that the senior faculty tend to feel freer than I do in asking grad students to do stupid blah boring grant-submission tasks.
posted by Anna on March 30th, 2005 at 6:57 pmBTW, Alexandra and Mandrake, you are both right — I shouldn’t be commenting here. But if I commented on GEO issues where I am, a pack of rabid union stewards would come beat the shit out of me — it’s called “card count neutrality”.
posted by Anna on March 30th, 2005 at 7:00 pmDo you work on the NY waterfront?
posted by Dale on March 31st, 2005 at 9:14 amWell, after my friend was hauled to Washington to testify before the NLRB after asking some organizers to leave his lab when he was working with radioactive material, it’s felt like it.
posted by Anna on March 31st, 2005 at 9:48 amMy comment about commenting here was less of an insult to Anna and more a comment upon my own addiction to this fucking site which keeps me from doing things in the real world. When I leave I’ll be sure to stop by every once in a while and say hello and HA HA HA YOU’RE STILL IN ANN ARBOR!!!!!!
posted by DrMandrake on March 31st, 2005 at 4:39 pm