GSA MEETING MINUTES
December 4, 2003
Attendance
Officers: Allison Luengen (Treasurer), Susanne Altermann (Secretary), Vicky Tarumoto (IVP), Joni Wajaryb (EVP), Emily Robinson (President), Ian Dobbs-Dixon (CPB Rep).
Department Reps: Kelly Reiner (Education), Karen Artiles (MCD Biology), Marla Holt (SFAC), Nicholas Konidaris (Astronomy), Dirk Robinson (Electrical Engineering), Beth Daniels (Psychology), Lisa Downward (Physics), Sajeemas Pasakdee (Environmental Studies).
Others: Aarti Iyer (Psychology), Kai Pommerenke (Economics), Amin Charaniya (Computer Science), Angela Rosales (SUA), Paul Thiem (Psychology), Sina Farsiu, Steven Alvarez (SUA), Jamus Lim (Economics).
Approval of Agenda and Minutes
Agenda approved and November 2003 minutes approved.
Student Regent Presentation
Cindy Edinger spoke about the UC student regent position. Applications are due February 19, 2004. Applicants from the north campuses are reviewed by the southern campuses and vice versa. UCSA interviews the semifinalists, and the final pick is by the regents.
Action: We will announce this to all graduate students through email.
Funding
Allison (Treasurer) requests a family size refrigerator for the GSA office, so it is easier for us to cater events in the future. Susi will help Allison shop.
Motion approved by consensus: $500 approved to be spent on a refrigerator.
Allison also requests a photocopier for the GSA office. This was put on hold, waiting for more price information.
Committee Reports
SFAC (Marla Holt)
Funding decisions have already been made but not yet released. Things look good for GSA’s requests. Marla corrected her SFAC report (November meeting) saying that the University actually uses Chapter 640, not the CSF Standing Policy.
Committee on Planning and Budget (Ian)
It appears that the new Graduate Division has no vision for graduate education at UCSC. A new Associate Dean will be hired soon. The job announcement goes out in January. Vicky: Are we on the hiring committee?
Action: Emily will ask Grad Council about grad participation on the hiring committee.
Transportation (Susi)
Transportation and Parking Services is going to do a trial run of free motorcycle parking at the remote lots. It’s unclear why this action was taken (Susi will follow up).
Santa Cruz Metro and UCSC are negotiating a new contract. SCMTD is dealing with a $3 million dollar shortfall now, and the new contract they want would mean a 50% increase fees (I think this is spread out over the next 10 years). UCSC cannot absorb all these costs without increasing fees and/or having less service. This is at a time when UCSC is doing exceptionally well in minimizing the number of single occupant vehicles coming on campus.
Allison suggested covered bike racks, Paul suggested better bike racks at Science Hill (especially at Baskin where they are “too low”). The group speculated about why UCSC can’t run its own bus system and forget SCMTD.
WASC (Jamus)
There is support for a graduate college. TAships are not a sustainable way to fund graduate school and the new college could attract funding. The first WASC accreditation committee visit is coming up in February and the campus wants to give a good impression. They will need graduate students to sit down with and talk to.
Action: Jamus agreed to write an email to circulate to all grads about this upcoming opportunity.
Grad Housing (Beth)
A letter is going out to lots of people in the administration characterizing how expensive graduate housing is. UCSC is the most expensive in the UC system, and we have very high turnover. We will not be able to affect the rate charged for next year, since this will be set very soon.
Action: Emily will include this letter in the GSA Action Agenda to go to Grad Council.
Affirmative Action (Kelly)
The committee has been picking departments to receive funds for their recruitment activities.
Elections
Committee on Planning and Budget
Ian must leave his position on this committee because he has accepted a temporary fellowship at UCB. CPB is the faculty’s top committee on budget. The administration has its own, separate, committee on budget. Kai, Paul, and Aarti ran for this position.
Election result: Aarti will be our next CPB Rep.
External Vice President
Joni is resigning his position, and we will be electing a new EVP in January. The EVP has voting power on the UC-wide UCSA which meets monthly and is currently very active. There was much talk of making this 2 or 3 related positions because it can be so demanding. The EVP stipend is $1120/quarter.
Action: GSA will send out an email announcing this position and indicating that if there is enough interest in this kind of work, we will consider adding additional positions (with stipends).
Tax Seminar Organization
Suggestions were made that there should be several seminars. At least one for international students, and possibly one focused on families. We should prepare a list of questions for the speaker. The Natural Sciences Business Office may be able to help us with some issues, they have been very helpful in the past. Emily: we should have the speaker run through a typical TA example, since most people are in this situation, and then take questions.
Action: Nick volunteered to organize our graduate tax seminars.
Action Agenda
This will be presented to the Graduate Council on January 29th.
GSHIP
Allison: should we be pushing to restore our GSHIP benefits? Kai: what percent of grads actually use GSHIP? Is there some way we could increase benefits and find some financial aid for those who can’t afford it? Joni: let’s have a referendum to restore our health benefits, an expression of reprimand to the university. Allison: would be opt to pay more, to get better coverage?
It’s unclear if we voted to increase our premiums, whether the university would be obligated to pay. Also, it may be cheaper to go to another system such as an HMO. It would be a good idea to send GSHIP testimonies to the WASC committee!
Survey
New name: “assessing the graduate student experience.” Allison: let’s include alternative transportation options.
International student fees
Vicky: I’ve been collecting articles about his.
Action: Emily will give Vicky the “old letter” on international student fees.
Social-Political Gathering
Student Regent Matt Murray will be here January 30th and we are to host his dinner. Jodi, the student regent designate, will also be here.
Action: Emily will put in a funding request for this.
Adjourn.
UC Santa Cruz, Graduate Student Association:
Action Agenda, 2003-4
The UC Santa Cruz Graduate Student Association has approved five action agenda items for this year. They are listed in ranked order, and are described in more depth in the following document.
1. Graduate Student Health Insurance Plan
2. Housing
3. Survey/Study of the UCSC grad student experience, from recruitment to retention to graduation and placement
4. International student fees
5. Graduate College
Graduate Student Health Insurance Plan (GSHIP)
The GSA has two main goals concerning GSHIP, one local and more short-term goal, and one that’s long-term and state-wide.
- local: get someone to be our advocate, who will bargain for us with the broker (negotiator)
o we expect this person to meet regularly with the GSHIP committee
Survey/Study of the UCSC Graduate Student Experience
We would like UCSC to sponsor a comprehensive study of the graduate student experience, both incorporating and complementing the WASC charge to assess graduate programs. We envision this as a holistic study that encompasses a wide range of topics, from recruitment to retention to graduation and placement. We would like a questionnaire to be given to every prospective who turns down UCSC, a quality-of-life questionnaire given to current graduate students, and a systematized exit interview for all graduate students who leave UCSC, either to drop out, transfer, or graduate. The entrance and exit interviews should be held every year; the quality-of-life questionnaire does not have to be administered as frequently, but it should be regular (perhaps every 4 years).
There are several reasons for running such a study. First, this would be a fact-finding study, giving the administration, faculty, and the GSA a better sense of the specific needs of graduate students. As such, it would demonstrate the areas in which UCSC is doing well, enabling grad students, faculty and administration to ‘sell’ UCSC to prospective students; it also would reveal more clearly the areas that still need improvement. Second, this study could be a useful lobbying tool, demonstrating how graduate education differs from undergraduate; this is vital, especially during this time of increased political scrutiny of the University of California. Finally, this study is necessary because right now there is no method for surveying grad students.
We have compiled a list of suggested topics that could/should appear on the survey. They are broken into the three categories of recruitment, retention, and leaving.
I. Recruitment
- why did you choose to attend UCSC?
o Quality of UCSC
o Quality of specific department
o Amount of support
o To work with a specific professor(s)
o location
- why did you choose not to attend UCSC?
o Cost of living
o Better offer elsewhere
o Chose a more prestigious school
o Decided not to go to graduate school
IV. Retention
Retention encompasses many factors, both academic and non-academic, which influence people’s success in graduate school. We are interested in both aspects.
o academic life
§funding levels and sources (in all divisions)
§space – how much office/lab space per student?
§Career planning and support
§Quality of graduate education
§Quality of advising
§Range, frequency of course offerings
§Interdisciplinary opportunities
§Accessibility of professors, staff
§Academic arbitration – how often is the ombudsman used? Do people choose not to report problems? How often?
§Quality of library, on-line resources
§Rank compared to other unis, programs
o extracurricular life
§stress level
§hours/week spent working
§parking availability and cost
§cost of living
§disposable income after rent
§health care and counseling – how often do you go to either? How much do you spend?
§Demographics: single, couple, kids? Gender, race, socioeconomic?
V. leaving/exit interview
- graduating
o what was your time to degree?
o What job placement have you secured?
o Did you get adequate support in your job search?
- Transferring
o Why are you transferring?
- leaving graduate school
o why?
§Got sick of it
§Lack of funding
§Personal reasons vs. academic reasons
- in general
o Considering your experience here, would you decide to come here again? Would you encourage other people to come here?
Some of this information presumably is collected already by individual departments, but there is no division-wide data collection, organization and analysis. We request that the UCSC administration, specifically the graduate dean, locate an organization capable of running such a project, and, in consultation with the GSA, work with them to put it together. The GSA sees the above sample as illustrative of the kind of study we think is necessary, not the study itself (we are not equipped to put this together). We are willing to commit partial funding, and request that the Graduate Division do the same.