TO: Division of Biology Graduate Students

FROM: Dave Rintoul, Associate Director

RE: Stipend increase for Spring 2003

The graduate faculty of the Biology Division met to discuss increasing graduate support to approximately $18,000. Consensus was achieved that this policy was a positive step toward strengthening our graduate program. Unless significant negative comments are received soon from faculty who are affected by this proposal, it will be implemented starting with the spring semester 2003.

For Spring 2003: $18,082 total support package = $600 biweekly for GTAs

($15,600 annual stipend + $2,482 tuition waiver for GTAs, $18,082 stipend for GRAs who must pay tuition)

Concomitant with this increase in pay, we also need to remind faculty and students that graduate school is a “full-time job”. GAC members also achieved a consensus about this policy, which was an assumption that apparently needed to be made more explicit. The following paragraph will go into effect immediately, and will be appended to all letters of admission in the future.

"The purpose of the graduate teaching or research assistantship is to allow students to devote their full-time efforts to their scholarly activities. No additional employment may be undertaken which would detract from this full-time effort. Should the student feel additional employment is necessary, then s/he must seek prior permission from her/his Major Advisor and the Graduate Affairs Committee. After review of the mitigating circumstances, the Graduate Affairs Committee may recommend that the Dean of the Graduate School allow employment within defined limits. Failure to adhere to these guidelines could result in the discontinuance of the assistantship."

There are several ramifications that come with this increase in stipend. As noted previously, the Division gets a lump sum from the College of Arts and Sciences to allocate for GTA stipend. The number of GTA positions that we can fund obviously depends upon the amount per stipend. This increase in salary would be decreasing our GTA numbers from 24 to 20. This means:

1) As was painfully elucidated a year ago, graduate student teaching assignments depend almost exclusively on the number of graduate students in the program. Currently we have enough graduate students (approx. 50) so that the weekly contact hour requirement is 4 hours. If graduate student numbers fall much below that, weekly contact hour requirements will increase.

2) A proposal, under consideration by the GAC, would have allowed graduate students to have no teaching assignment during their final semester. This probably cannot be implemented anytime soon. Implementation of any proposal which decreases the teaching requirement is also strongly dependent on the numbers of graduate students, and the spring 2003 stipend increase will at least temporarily decrease the number of graduate students.

In order to maintain the number of graduate students, and decrease the teaching requirement per graduate student, several strategies are available to increase the resources available for stipends. As noted in the Sept. faculty meeting, efforts are ongoing to identify and obtain extramural funds for the Division through training grants or similar programs. Strenuous lobbying will continue at the College level to provide increased funding for Biology GTAs. Faculty members are encouraged to include stipend support on all grants, and to provide funding for current GTAs in their labs. Graduate students are encouraged to apply for fellowships, which will not only potentially enhance their financial situation (most competitive outside fellowships are funded at a higher level than $18,000), but will enhance their credentials as well.