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NEW PALTZ - SUNY graduate students who teach classes and perform
other vital tasks on the New Paltz campus have launched a campaign
demanding pay parity with their counterparts at the system's
four university centers.
On Wednesday, the Communications Workers of America Local 1104/Graduate
Student Employees Union held a rally to call attention to their
demands in advance of contract negotiations with university
officials at New Paltz, which begin Monday.
A prime concern, union leaders said, is the relatively low
pay for teaching assistants and graduate assistants at the school
compared to their counterparts at SUNY's university centers
in Binghamton, Buffalo, Stony Brook and Albany.
According to the union, stipends for New Paltz teaching and
graduate assistants, who teach classes and assist professors
with research in the English department, average $5,000 per
year, along with free tuition for six credits. The average for
all graduate student employees at the school is $3,206.
At the university centers, where teaching assistant and graduate
assistant duties are handled by doctoral candidates, students
earn an average of $9,000 for the same work.
"We're going for parity," said Chad Pearson, business agent
at large for the union local. "But we definitely need to see
some improvement. I don't think our members would vote for a
contract which didn't offer at least $7,000 (as minimum pay)."
Jennifer Smits, a graduate student who teaches an English composition
class, said the $5,000 stipend does not allow her to pay rent,
much less attend conferences where she can read and attempt
to publish her work. Smits said she spends about 25 hours per
week teaching and grading papers for her class in addition to
her own course work and a 15-hour-per-week job tutoring students.
"You're stressed out all the time because you don't know how
you're going to make your rent," Smits said. "You don't eat
well, you don't sleep well. We're like starving artists."
David Lavallee, the SUNY New Paltz dean of academic affairs,
said the SUNY system's 12 colleges could not afford to pay the
assistants rates comparable to the university centers, which
receive about 95 percent of the SUNY system's budget. Lavallee
also said the university centers must pay higher rates to compete
with other doctoral programs.
"One can argue that (assistants at the colleges and university
centers) all teach classes, and maybe they should get the same
stipend," Lavallee said. "But there simply isn't as much funding
available here." |