University of Iowa grad students protest fees and low wages

IOWA CITY - University of Iowa graduate students say low teaching wages and high fees are keeping talented young people from considering higher education.

Kate Kedley, a doctoral student in the UI College of Education, serves as an adjunct instructor at Kirkwood Community College and Cornell College on top of her UI duties in order to support her three children, she said during a news conference Friday.

'My family of four is below the federal poverty line,” said Kedley, of Cedar Rapids.

The Campaign to Organize Graduate Students (COGS) released a paper Friday describing financial insecurity faced by UI graduate students. The union reports 33 percent of UI graduate students earn wages that put them below the poverty level. Mandatory fees, which have increased 500 percent in 14 years, eat into grad students' meager earnings, COGS President Jeannette Gabriel said.

One reason for low pay is many UI departments provide only quarter-time or one-third-time teaching appointments to grad students, she said.

UI Graduate College Dean John Keller said the UI has encouraged departments to offer half-time appointments when feasible, but some programs offer quarter-time or one-third-time positions to spread limited resources to more students.

'Currently graduate assistants at a 25 percent appointment or greater, receive full tuition at the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences (CLAS) rates and benefits allocations,” Keller said in an email to The Gazette. Students, like Kedley, who are in the College of Education are assessed a tuition supplement, for which they don't receive a scholarship. he said.

Nicole Filloon, a Coralville mother pursuing a doctoral degree in sociology, said she pays $1,136 a year in mandatory fees, which would be better spent on rent, health insurance or after-school programming for her son.

Some universities, including the University of Michigan, Michigan State University, Oregon State University and the University of California, have waived or reduced fees for grad students, COGS reported.

COGS has asked the UI to reduce fees for several years, Keller said, but the university's position is that all students - undergraduate and graduate - pay fees to support university facilities and services.

'It is true that mandatory fees have increased over time, but each mandatory fee, whether a new fee or an increase to an existing mandatory fee is specifically discussed with student leadership before being submitted for approval by the (Iowa Board of) Regents,” Keller said.

Keller said it's hard to pin a decline in grad school enrollment on the financial burden faced by for grad students. He said the UI still is in the top quarter of Big Ten universities and the University of Chicago for payments to grad students.