Do we just get an early Thanksgiving break or something? What about exams?

Err, huh: "as their supposed to"?

(Also, it's impossible to post as Anonymous.)

I know the university is under "budgetary constraints", but making the minimum amount the University says is required to live in the city = "extraordinary demands"? If we were living on the provost's salary, it would probably be easy for us to hang tight for a few years as well.

I expect you to get all your answers soon. I'm a little surprised about how long it's taken for this to get everybody's attention. Those who have been or seen educational strikes before know how crippling they are - it's hardly a mere inconvenience. At least people are paying attention now and the word's spread.

From what I gather, if the strike proceeds, it will be a department-by-department, class-by-class decision on whether to continuing holding classes or offer alternatives. Obviously your particular TAs will be a major determining factor. Keep in mind that while 92% of ~800 voting members voted to strike, a far greater majority haven't voiced anything - i.e. the strike is potentially campus-wide or limited to certain departments.

As a previous graduate student on this campus and someone who voted for the GEO I am not 100% supportive of this strike. The facts are that the University is under a huge budgetary constraint. The university still does not know what state resources will be allocated and the campus is living on borrowed time with stimulus funds. Those are just plain facts. Departments have been asked to plan for a permanent decrease in funds ranging from bad to impossible. How departments will achieve this goal is still in question. Keep in mind, most department's budgets are over 90% in salary leaving virtually no 'extra' for paper, paper clips, let alone salary increases. This year the vast majority of salaried employees received a 0% raise and last year the academic professions received only a 1 1/2% increase. That said, I do believe that people who earn the least on this campus should receive a higher percentage raise than the top tier. I have never understood the blanket percentage raises. I would also like to point out that most civil service personnel do not earn as much per hour as graduate students or even academic professionals. In fact, when I graduated with a PhD I took a pay cut from my graduate student hourly wage.

I do find it interesting that the argument of working 50% time should earn a living wage. What about the graduate students who have a 25% position or 67% position? I also wonder if the 16K is for 9 or 12 months? Is the 16K for a single person or a family?

I realize that the contract dispute is not 100% about $$s. So let's take a look at some of the other requests.

1) Health insurance - I would not call the current situation dismal. I would say it is better than most. I actually had to use this insurance for high hospitalization bills when I was a graduate student. This insurance paid way more than what my current university health insurance would have paid, in the thousands. I know a lot of people dislike McKinnley. I personally loved the place. Then again it covered most of my meds. I do think that there should be some kind of 'drug benefit' above and beyond McKinnley. Not only for the students, but also for the family members that are sometimes covered when you pay the additional fee. For years I paid out of pocket for medication for my children. Unless the situation has changed, and it may have, I also think that the health insurance should cover preventative care for dependents.

2) Tuition and Fee waiver - let's not kid ourselves, this is no small cost to the university. It costs millions to educate the graduate students. Should there be some kind of language in a contract protecting graduate students current agreement for a tuition a fee waiver if they hold a 25%-67% assistanceship, absolutely, the university should not be allowed to 'change the rules' midstream. This is one reason why the GEO was formed, so graduate students can have a voice in their employment contract.

3) Golden Parachutes - I just want to remind everyone that the administrators who are resigning from their current administrative position can not be fired, one word, tenure. Also, to the best of my knowledge, the university did not 'pay these contracts off'.

4) Poor allocation of resources on this campus. Undoubtedly, most people will find that the university has wasted money on some project. Real structural change needs to occur on how courses are funded. Currently, departments do not receive a certain amount per seat they fill in a class. Something that is counter intuitive to funding of courses.

5) I am happy to hear that the university is granting some time off for parental leave. When I was a grad student there was 0 time off except for the sick leave and I returned back to the classroom seven days after my son was born.

I am sure that I have not covered everything that the GEO would like to see in the new contract and ask that a fair and reasonable discussion occur regarding all of these issues.

Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses earning $21 an hour plus free tuition...

On second thought, if you can't live thriftly why don't you get a student loan and say a little prayer for all the minimum wage working stiffs who can't?

Evidently, it's extraordinary to expect that we should make a living wage (the amount of money that the University itself has said is need to make ends meet in this town) and not be subject to furloughs (that is, excessive pay cuts for employees who would then make even less than a living wage and nonetheless still have to work the same amount of hours).

And for the record, these "budgetary constraints" do not exist. If it's not enough to have one of the largest alumni donation years in the university's history, a 1.1 % budget increase from the state legislature, and millions in higher education stimulus money from the federal government, then what will it take for us to not be in a budget crisis? The fact is that the university wouldn't even respond to the GEO's non-monetary proposals, citing a budget crisis for what had nothing to do with the budget.

This is my first year as a grad student and a TA, and I'm a foreign international student, who has always had this nice thoughts about civil rights movements, strikes and protests in the US. This has got to be one of the most exciting things I've experienced so far in my time here , a truly cultural one! Oh, and for those who say that the GEO strike is bad, selfish and unrepresentative, do remember that this would be the first time that we have successfully organized a movement such as this at this university, in the hopes of getting a better, easier way to survive graduate school. This is historic, especially in the light of all the scandals that the university has endured the past few months. Strikes and protests are never bad-they bring to the surface diverse and important issues, and provide us with deeper understanding of the work that we do. Only through the efforts of the GEO do I now know so much more about how different grad students engage in their work and research as teachers and students across campus, and it has been an enlightening experience. As an international, I depend completely on the university, so not having a contract and facing the prospect of being laid off or not paid is terrifying because without the assistantship, I have very few options due to visa restrictions. It would be nice to have a guarantee and peace of mind knowing that, at least for the five+ years I will be here, my needs are taken of. Have I mentioned that being in a strike just sounds so much FUN and exciting! I can't wait!

Many people criticizing the GEO rely on the argument that graduate employees benefit greatly from the tuition waiver part of our compensation package. While this is true in many cases, there are also many of us who do not benefit from it. PhD programs require multiple stages and only one of those is coursework. After the completion of coursework, there is the not-so-small matter of researching and writing a dissertation and these stages do not require full-time enrollment and, therefore, the tuition waiver serves little purpose for the majority of our time in a PhD program. Those of you who claim to have earned a terminal degree here should be well aware of that fact.

Instead of characterizing us as greedy and selfish, try to consider our position. Upon accepting a position, we are expected to perform all of our responsibilities to the best of our abilities; we are expected to be reliable. Is it really unacceptable to ask the administration to provide us with a contract on which we can rely?

According to the story on the News-Gazette, the avg. salary for a nine-month, 20 hr./wk position is $13,430. I don't know if that is accurate, but it was what they reported, so it is what I'll use. Most Civil Service employees at UI work a 37.5 or 40 hr week. Assuming the worst case scenario of 37.5 hrs/wk, the grad student salary equates out to $25,181.25/yr. (13,430/20hrs wk x 37.5 hrs. wk). This is for nine months. If you ran that out to 12 months, like most full-time employees work, you get a salary of $33,575. I understand that there is a difference in benefits - insurance, probably time off, etc., but this amount doesn't even include the tuition waiver. As a full-time Civil Service UI employee, I'm eligible for an 11-hour/semester waiver (assuming I attend a UI school) or 6-hour/semester waiver (if I attend a state school other than UI). Again, I'm no expert, but it seems like they're getting a full waiver. As a full-time permanent Civil Service employee at the University, I make just under $30k year. If you remove the difference in benefits from the equation, the avg. grad assistant already makes $3,500 more than me (if he/she were to work a full-time, 37.5 hr, 12 month position). You're telling me this isnt enough? Why should he or she get a giant 20% raise when the rest of the campus gets nothing? Grad students need to realize that they are here to LEARN, to get an education, not to get rich off of being a grad student. The University is paying for them to attend school, for free, and giving them what is most DEFINITELY a living wage on top of that. I worked retail, full-time, for 4 years, and barely made more than $13k, working full-time, 12 months a year, and I was able to live just fine. Why are these individuals any different? Stop whining and be happy you make a wage that many people would be happy to make right now as well as a FREE world-class education that will enable them to go out in a year or two and make much, much more.

First of all, the $21/an hour statistic is a joke. Apparently you got that figure from the faculty/staff email that Easter sent out, but you neglected to see the statistical gymnastics that he went through to get there. He averaged (rather than citing a mean or mode) wages of the top 60% of grad student salaries. If $16,000/yr were a representative statistic for people working 50% appointments or better, the GEO's request that the minimum wage for 50% appointments be $16,000 would be extremely *easy* for the university!

Secondly, this "free tuition" thing is completely convoluted. As a PhD student writing my dissertation, I don't even take classes anymore, and when I did, the only resource that those courses required of the university was a couple of faculty members meeting with me and fellow students once a week to talk about our research. The economic resources that the university takes to educate me are extremely minimal, so no, the university is not putting itself out to pay for my "free tuition."

Thirdly, we can't even count on our "free tuition" in the future if the university won't allow it in the contract, which is one of the reasons that we're striking.

Fourthly, the university is proposing to furlough us in a way that makes us do the same amount of work while losing up to one month's pay. Would YOU just take a month's pay cut in stride?

I'm not claiming to be a refugee standing on Ellis Island; I just think that a world class university should be able to pay its graduate employees the cost of living while they're here studying and working. Otherwise, a graduate education is just for the wealthy or debt-ridden. The university's explanation that their funding from the private sector is up but cannot be used to pay TA's is hardly passable. Is our public university becoming so corporate and privatized that most of our budget can't even be used for education anymore? I for one am not going to nod my head and accept that as an excuse from admin: "OHHH, I get it. You've sold out our university. Well then, forget my petty need to pay my bills."

I really think that the grad students need a reality check. There are people out there who only make $15,000 and have a family to support. So, they have plenty of money to support themselves. By striking, you're going to affect other students education and we don't really care about what you want. How about instead of crying about it, take out some loans like everyone else. Start acting like adults..

I really think that the grad students need a reality check. There are people out there who only make $15,000 and have a family to support. So, they have plenty of money to support themselves. By striking, you're going to affect other students education and we don't really care about what you want. How about instead of crying about it, take out some loans like everyone else. Start acting like adults..

Not making the cost of living is a poor excuse for an increase in wages when they could be living in the grad dorms for what they are making (http://www.iei.uiuc.edu/housing_index.html) and still have money to go out.

How about this for a solution: Each grad employee gets a room, with a roommate, in a grad dorm along with a meal plan, along with the difference in the salary they are currently getting. Its what they want right? To be able to afford the cost of living? Just give the living to them then they have nothing to bitch about!

Dear Ugh, The GEO is simply trying to secure tuition wavers in the current contract. Many TAs do not get tuition wavers, and the university wants to take more away. Even when they do have tuition wavers, they have to pay fees for health care and other administrative costs. Many TAs are finished taking courses and working on dissertations, so they don't cost the university tuition money and bring in far more money in undergrad tuition from the classes they teach. You are relying on data about average salaries. Some TAs, in the sciences and business schools, make more. But many, in English, History, Communication etc. make the minimum and teach a majority of the classes. The GEO not trying to increase the average salary, they are trying to boost the minimum salary, which is far below the living wage. You also also assuming TAs get paid 12 months out of the year. Most of them only get paid 9 months out of 12 lose their health benefits during the summer and have to buy into a supplement plan.

In their contract offer, the administration wants to reserve the right to pay TAs "in kind"-- so they could pay them in apples if they want to. Ugh-- right? And they want to freeze the TAs wages, even though the cost of living is rising and tuition will increase. Yes, graduate students have it better than many workers. But this isn't a zero sum game. The GEO has been very supportive of other unions and workers in general on this campus. If graduate employees can secure a living wage, and they can get the university to take away ridiculous furloughs, they will set a standard for other employees and send the university a message.

How much is 0.2% of the overall budget? My guess would be several hundred thousand or even million. You expect the University to just come up with that kind of money? I sympathize with your plight, but from one graduate student to another, I think you are being unreasonable. Perhaps a more convincing argument for your cause is that not everyone was forced to accept a salary freeze --- top administrators for example. I don't think the demands are unreasonable, but the timing of them is.

You should try to consider what this university provides for you beyond coursework for free. The tuition waiver doesn't serve little purpose beyond courses--by using university resources (e.g. offices, staff members, lab space, etc.) you are benefiting from a tuition waiver. By having the opportunity to be advised by some extremely intelligent professors you are benefiting from a tuition waiver.

The reality is that graduate school is a ton of work with very little reward. You knew this going in. Stop whining and complaining and be happy that we do get tuition waivers and a stipend of any kind. Honestly, I doubt you spend more than 20 hours a week on your TA appointment, so asking for more money IS selfish. Stop complaining and get back to work so that you can graduate sooner and get a living wage salary.

Strikes are NOT fun nor are they exciting--get a clue. They are a pain and headache for many people involved. Undergraduates are going to be the ones that are affected the most in a negative way. This isn't something to be happy about.

I really think that the grad students need a reality check. There are people out there who only make $15,000 and have a family to support. So, they have plenty of money to support themselves. By striking, you're going to affect other students education and we don't really care about what you want. How about instead of crying about it, take out some loans like everyone else. Start acting like adults..

I hope Ikenberry pulls a Reagan and fires all of you if you go on strike. I think every GEO member is forgetting that we (as in the collective U.S. population) are going through hard economic times - and therefore should be happy if we even have jobs. The GEO on the other hand, is being super selfish expecting to be paid a full-time salary for their part-time job duties.

If your complaining about not having enough money, get another small part time job. Where there's a will there's a way, so if you are really want to succeed you'll figure out how to manage with 2 part time jobs in addition to your studies. And if you can't somehow find a way to manage 2 part time jobs and school work, well you must not want to succeed that badly.

You've all heard of uour grandparent's struggles to make ends meet, and even your parents'. Why should you expect to just glide by, carefree in life?

I can't speak for the GEO - only myself.

I have been given a 25% assistantship. This means I work for a small wage, but still have to work on the side in order to pay rent, utilities, food, and the pile of books necessary for a graduate education. That's all fine with me - I knew that was the deal going in, and I certainly never expected to get rich as a graduate student. I like that I provide skilled labor for the University and earn my education as I go.

I will go on strike if the GEO calls one, and here's my personal reason: The university will not guarantee that my tuition waiver will not be pulled at ANY point. The administration considered doing so last year, and without contract language preventing it, they could do so at any time. If that happened, my education would come to an end. Period. Can the university not afford to give its students this commitment?

Instead, the university A) will not give us this guarantee, B) tries to get us to sign away our right to dispute such a decision should it come about, and C) threatens furloughs that will disproportionately hurt all low-paid university employees (including graduate students).

I can't afford to accept those terms. I'm not pleased that striking will hurt the students, faculty and staff with whom I interact, but I firmly believe they will be hurt more if I, and graduate students like me, can no longer afford to study at the University. We would simply go to other universities that offer stable funding, and the University would give up its status as a world-class educational institution. This would also devalue the degrees received by every student at the University.

I believe that an appropriate middle ground can be found. I also believe that the GEO have done more to find it than the administration has. All we hear from the Interim Provost is that this dispute is about money, and that there's no money to give out. There's much more to it than that.

I also assure you that, if my interests and the GEO leadership's interests diverge, I will be right back at work, picket line or no. If a strike is called, I will honor it until I can afford not to.

Your arguments don't hold water. I suggest using that tuition waiver to take a basic class on rhetoric, perhaps one that a TA, whom you clearly despise so much, might be teaching.

First, you build up a nice strawman of a grad student who somehow makes a mythical 33 grand a year. Now, lets think about this for a moment. (Most) grad students don't get paid over 12 months. 9 months is the norm with 11 being a rare exception. When they are not working for the University, most domestic grad students get a job. Here that means over the summer, usually doing something like waiting tables, which means no time to do their work (which, incidentally, is not like undergrad work that you can do with an hour here, an hour there, it takes significant chunks of time to sit, think, and work). International students are not allowed to take another job, due to visa restrictions. So their choice is to rely on someone else to pay for them (family, etc), hope a professor has summer money for them, or go back home and accomplish nothing on their research. So that extension to 12 months does not really factor in.

Now, a 50% appointment is for 20 hours of work per week. We are not allowed to take jobs that require much more time than that because we are expected to use the remaining 20-40 hours of 'free' time we have to actually complete our research, take our classes, do our homework, or even do more TA work that we can't get done in the 20 hours we are allotted. So you can't really extend that salary to 40 hours a week, either.

Lastly, you compare your pay (without benefits) to ours (with benefits). We have barely acceptable health coverage. Barely passable dental. Nearly useless optical (and most of our jobs involve us staring at computer screens all day). Over priced, inconvenient parking. You get good health coverage, dental, optical, parking rates based on your position in the University, job security, etc.

So, when we compare your real salary, that is, the money you take home, plus your benefits, to our real salary, that is the money we take home, plus our benefits, we find that you are paid a living wage (per the Universities definition). On average, grad students are not.

Our educations are not free. We spend a significant amount of our own money on books, parking, fees, all of which, up front, at the beginning a semester can cost well more than the money we take home after taxes. That is before paying for rent, water, power, gas, and food. Many of us rely on student loans, aka, debt, to get us through, which is the antithesis of free. Grad school, in some ways, is much like indentured servitude.

Finally, I'm not sure if you noticed, but costs of living went up by hundreds of dollars per month over the past few years. That $13k you made working full time back in 1985 is not nearly the same as $13k now. Additionally, if $13k was enough, the University would have that listed as its cost of living, not $16k. On that note, if they did reduce the cost of living, that would affect how much federal aid that students qualify for, which would cut off the blank checks that are the student loans that the University counts on to fund administrative blowhards.

Not making the cost of living is a poor excuse for an increase in wages when they could be living in the grad dorms for what they are making (http://www.iei.uiuc.edu/housing_index.html) and still have money to go out.

How about this for a solution: Each grad employee gets a room, with a roommate, in a grad dorm along with a meal plan, along with the difference in the salary they are currently getting. Its what they want right? To be able to afford the cost of living? Just give the living to them then they have nothing to whine about!

Bless you! I needed a good smile today, and your comment got me through! :)

A strike is a serious issue, not a "fun" thing. York University in Canada had 3 strikes in 12 years which has devastated the reputation of the school, and most importantly wreaked havok on the plans, education and lives of students.

Please be serious.