Statement from original members of the GSO for their first meeting with the Deans

November 13, 1997

Dear Dean Berkey and Associate Dean Whitaker:

On behalf of a group of concerned graduate students, we'd like to acknowledge the move to increase continuing teaching fellow (TF) stipends to the level of new TF's starting this spring. We look forward to your continued commitment to an even pay rate.

As a follow-up to our meeting, we'd like to bring a number of issues to your attention:

Cost of Living

As you know, Boston is an expensive place to live. The following are some of the costs that we as graduate students incur.

According to the GRS brochure, the 9-month cost of living for students is between $11,960 - $13,110. Estimating taxes on income at 20%, this would require students to earn a stipend in the range of $14,950 - $16,388. As graduate students at BU, we find it difficult to make ends meet at current stipend rates. For example, in this year's rental market, which has a 1% vacancy rate, many of us are forced to pay higher rents than we would in a more open market. With this in mind, we'd like to propose the implementation of a yearly 4% increase to stipends.

Even with the increase to stipend pay in the spring, new TF's are still making $500 more this semester. We'd like to ask you to provide this extra money to continuing TF's to completely rectify this year's pay disparity. For many of us, $500 after taxes doesn't even pay one month's rent, and this extra money would help mitigate our monthly costs. In addition, some departments split fellowships between the fall and spring. We feel it would be appropriate to acknowledge the contribution of the TF's who are teaching this fall but will not benefit from the increase in the spring. From the Financial Aid Office, an estimate of the number of TF's this year is about 340 (some of which are new students). Thus, the single lump-sum amount needed to close this gap is approximately $150,000. You've stressed that BU operates as a business when you've described your need to respond to market forces. Likewise, large businesses, like BU, have varied monetary resources, from which this one-time amount could come.

Disparities among Departments

We would also like to address the disparities among the departments in GRS. While TF's in different departments may have different duties, most TF's spend equivalent time performing the skilled work required for this job. For example, English TF's spend as much time teaching as TF's in Computer Science. Furthermore, we are all students in Boston, and thus, have similar expenses. Despite generating considerable grant money for the university, certain departments, such as Geography, fall in the lower pay bracket. The disparity unfortunately leads to a feeling of unfair treatment and we can find no clear rationale for this difference.

Teaching Fellow Responsibilities

Next, we would like to discuss the major contributions that TF's make to the University as well as the responsibilities they assume as a result of their appointment. Teaching fellows are an integral part without which the University would not be able to provide an education to undergraduates.

Rather than being treated as interns, TF's are largely expected to operate autonomously with minimal supervision. Many TF's work independently of faculty members in developing and teaching their own courses. This involves preparation of material, teaching the material in a classroom setting, setting office hours, and grading student's work. Without the contribution of TF's, many more hours would be demanded of the faculty to provide essential courses necessary to fulfill core requirements set by the University.

Specific teaching requirements vary between departments, with twenty hours per week of teaching-related duties as an approximate guideline. Some of the duties performed by TF's in various departments are:

TF's in the Computer Science department are expected to be available for up to six office hours per week.
TF's in various departments are required to lecture in discussion sections.
TF's in the English department develop and teach their own introductory classes.
TF's in the Chemistry department who teach laboratory classes are responsible for either three 3-hour labs or two 4-hour labs per week.
TF's in the Geography department sometimes perform up to 20 hours of grading per week.

Other duties include attending the main lecture of a class, attending weekly staff/teaching fellow meetings, and meeting with students on a need basis.

Research Assistant Stipends

Finally, we would like to address your statement that Teaching Fellows in the sciences quickly move onto grant-funded positions as Research Assistants (RA's) for which the pay is higher. TF's in the sciences sometimes hold this position for a few years out of necessity to the department in order to fill all teaching positions. When they do move into RA positions, the stipend generally remains comparable because the pay rate for RA's is based on TF stipends. As a result, research assistants in the sciences typically receive compensation equivalent to what they received as teaching fellows.

We appreciate the administrations willingness to open a dialogue with us and we would like to maintain an ongoing conversation about these issues and any other issues that may arise. Thank you very much for your time.

Sincerely,
<signed by 5 original members of the GSO>