Spring Break
Grad students voice concern over potential program changes
Catherine Couretas
Issue date: 11/21/08 Section: Front Page
Community members showed up before the university senate meeting Monday in support of Miami University students nervous about potential cuts in the graduate program.
With cuts being made across the university due to the university's budget crunch, many graduate students have become concerned with the reallocation of graduate assistantships across departments, according to Trey Orndorff, president of the graduate student association (GSA). Orndorff said one hundred fifty community members showed up Monday in support of graduate students.
Bruce Cochrane, dean of the graduate school, and Provost Jeffrey Herbst, began evaluating programs in the graduate school almost a year ago.
"It's not something me and the provost took on lightly," Cochrane said.
According to Orndorff, an ad-hoc committee was then created to sort out the graduate assistant (GA) reallocation process.
Evaluations by this committee had the university looking at reallocating graduate assistants as well as eliminating several positions, according to Orndorff.
Although there have been no written statements stating GA positions will be cut, Orndorff said it has been brought up verbally in graduate council and budget meetings.
According to Orndorff, the GSA agreed that the most important issue is looking at how cutting graduate assistants will affect undergraduates.
"Graduate students might have to teach larger class sizes," Brown said. "Other faculty are going to have to increase the size of introductory classes. It's going to ultimately decrease the quality of undergraduate education."
Sriram Devenathan, associate vice president of the GSA, agreed.
"The remaining graduate students will have to cover for the cuts," Devenathan said. "This will increase the working load of GAs and TAs (teaching assistants)."
Daniel Doty, benefits chair of the GSA, said that this could also have an effect on attracting faculty to Miami.
"We want faculty that are known and reputable," Doty said. "They won't come here without grad students. Grad students allow for faculty to do research."
With cuts being made across the university due to the university's budget crunch, many graduate students have become concerned with the reallocation of graduate assistantships across departments, according to Trey Orndorff, president of the graduate student association (GSA). Orndorff said one hundred fifty community members showed up Monday in support of graduate students.
Bruce Cochrane, dean of the graduate school, and Provost Jeffrey Herbst, began evaluating programs in the graduate school almost a year ago.
"It's not something me and the provost took on lightly," Cochrane said.
According to Orndorff, an ad-hoc committee was then created to sort out the graduate assistant (GA) reallocation process.
Evaluations by this committee had the university looking at reallocating graduate assistants as well as eliminating several positions, according to Orndorff.
Although there have been no written statements stating GA positions will be cut, Orndorff said it has been brought up verbally in graduate council and budget meetings.
According to Orndorff, the GSA agreed that the most important issue is looking at how cutting graduate assistants will affect undergraduates.
"Graduate students might have to teach larger class sizes," Brown said. "Other faculty are going to have to increase the size of introductory classes. It's going to ultimately decrease the quality of undergraduate education."
Sriram Devenathan, associate vice president of the GSA, agreed.
"The remaining graduate students will have to cover for the cuts," Devenathan said. "This will increase the working load of GAs and TAs (teaching assistants)."
Daniel Doty, benefits chair of the GSA, said that this could also have an effect on attracting faculty to Miami.
"We want faculty that are known and reputable," Doty said. "They won't come here without grad students. Grad students allow for faculty to do research."
Viewing Comments 1 - 4 of 4
roy
posted 11/21/08 @ 5:25 AM EST
"Faculty won't come here without graduate students"? Great news, because we don't want those kind of faculty to further degrade the priority, emphasis and quality of undergraduate education in the classroom. (Continued…)
zak
posted 11/21/08 @ 6:07 AM EST
Faculty are too busy to write recommendation letters for undergraduate students, so they have grad students write them instead?? If faculty are too busy or too important to do that, then they should refuse to allow their pay to be contaminated by any tuition dollars paid by our undergrads. (Continued…)
let me shirk
posted 11/21/08 @ 8:11 AM EST
But we can't pretend to be more like Ohio State if we don't have graduate programs.
Who do MY teaching if we don't have grad assistants?
How can I get away with teaching only 1 undergraduate class a semester if we don't have graduate students?
Who will program my clicker?
Who will do my Powerpont slides?
And most important of all, how can I play the Hodge-Herbst Miami game--you know, where we pretend to care about undergraduate education (snicker, snicker)--if I have to take extra time and mess with undergraduates?
You would think that undergraduates foot most of the bills around here. (Continued…)
Miami Jack
posted 11/21/08 @ 8:37 AM EST
To "let me shirk": There are seminars available on campus to teach faculty how to program their own auditorium-classroom clickers and how to prepare their own powerpoint slides, and they're conducted by scores of dedicated Miami personnel. (Continued…)
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