In an uncommon display of student activism at the University, the Graduate Labor Alliance plans to rally on the Lawn today demanding that the University provide full health insurance coverage for its 3,300 graduate students. The rally coincides with President John T. Casteen III's annual State of the University address and is another step in the two-year long effort.
The organized protest comes a week after high-level University officials announced they would recommend that the Board of Visitors create $900 a year health insurance stipends for all teaching and research assistants that earn over $5,000 per year. About 60 percent of all graduate students fall into that category.
Colette Sheehy, the University's vice president for management and budget, said the proposal is supported by nearly all University faculty, including the provost and the deans of the College and the Engineering School.
"The reason it has to go through the Board is because it's such a large commitment of funds," Sheehy said.
Though many graduate students consider this recommendation a great victory, some will not be satisfied until the University provides insurance for all.
Justin Gifford, the founder of GLA and an English Ph.D. student, said he is happy with the direction the administration is headed, but hopes the issue of subsidized health care for graduate students remains a priority.
"The rally is about the University following through on its promise to give 60 percent of graduates insurance," said Gifford, who formed the GLA about six weeks ago to raise public awareness of the issues associated with graduate health care.
Although the rally is scheduled for the same time as Casteen's speech in Old Cabell Hall, Gifford said the purpose of the rally is not to attack Casteen. In fact, Gifford said Casteen signed a petition for increased health coverage when he was strolling on the Lawn Thursday with recent University visitor Katie Couric.
Over the next year, Gifford and the GLA will campaign for the University to provide health coverage for all graduate students and their families.
The group, which had over 50 students come to its last few meetings, has been holding petition signings on the Lawn. If the Board does not pass the proposal, the GLA will urge graduate students to boycott QualChoice later in the year.
"It's a grassroots effort," said Patrick McGuinn, the president of the Graduate Council, which deals with all issues affecting graduate students, and a supporter of the GLA.
Coping with the expense
The GLA has moved the issue of graduate health insurance to the forefront of the administration's agenda, but many students have been committed to this issue for about two years.
The Board has required all students to have health insurance since 1967. Usually, this requirement is not a problem for undergraduates who often still are covered by their parents' insurance. But for graduate students who are starting out on their own, the financial burden of health insurance can be overwhelming.
Graduate students only are paid an average of $8,000 a year, so about one-eighth of their income goes back to QualChoice to cover health insurance. The University owns 50 percent of QualChoice and endorses the health care plan. Many graduate students do not know they have the option to choose another plan, such as Trigon and Golden Rule, Gifford said.
In fact, some graduate students do not have health insurance because they cannot afford it, said Karen Waters, a graduate student in the Curry School and the mother of a young daughter.
Waters took part-time jobs in order to get the health benefits that the University didn't offer her. She said the family plan through QualChoice is too expensive and not many students can afford it because QualChoice does not offer a monthly payment plan.
Other graduate students like Bart Welling provide health insurance for their children through Medicaid.
Welling, a Ph.D. student in the English department and the father of three small children, said Medicaid is the best option for students with children because it provides better health care than QualChoice, and no expensive loans are needed to afford it.
He said he supports the efforts of the GLA, but would like to see coverage for families.
"We would be grateful for the $900 but if they could go all the way and provide coverage for my family, that would be great."
Soaring QualChoice rates
QualChoice has raised the price of its two insurance plans for single graduate students by 16 and 56 percent. The White Plan, which provides basic coverage, has risen from $774 to $900 per year for a single student. The price of the more comprehensive Orange Plan rose from $1,409 to $2,200 per year for a single student.
The University also risks losing top graduate school applicants to other institutions that do offer health insurance plans, Gifford said. Many of the University's peer institutions - such as the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, the University of California at Berkeley and the University of Michigan - include graduate students' health insurance in student fellowships.
"To attract the best graduate students, the University needs to provide health insurance," Gifford said.
The Graduate Council has made University-funded health insurance its No. 1 priority for the past two years. It has two separate tracks to its ultimate goal. The first track is to keep the cost of health care down, so it is not a large financial burden to graduate students. Ultimately, the council hopes to persuade the University to provide free health insurance.
The council is confident that they have enough support from the University community to reach this goal, McGuinn said. Members have been meeting with faculty and administrators to convince them to support funded health insurance. The biggest obstacle is finding the money to pay for the insurance, he said.
Both the Graduate Council and Student Council passed resolutions in December that called for the University to pay for health insurance.
Former Student Council President Taz Turner, current President Joe Bilby and President-elect Abby Fifer have all worked closely with the Graduate Council to make this an important issue for all students, not just graduate students.
"Because we represent all students at the University, and we believe in this cause, we will do everything we can to see it happen," Fifer said.
Undergraduates are affected directly by the caliber of graduate students because they often have more interaction with graduate students than professors. In the English department, about 65 percent of all classes are taught by graduate TA's, Gifford said.
The future of the campaign
Now that the administration has promised to fund graduate health care, there are still several issues to work out.
Funding must be obtained and the Board must approve the project. It will cost the University $1.8 million annually to give $900 a year to 60 percent of graduate students. According to Sheehy, the money will come from three places: tuition, indirect cost recoveries on grants, and the University's endowment. The Board will vote on the graduate health care proposal as part of the whole University budget, which is presented in June.
The exact stipulations on the insurance stipend also must be ironed out. Assuming the Board passes the budget, the University must decide if it will give graduate students $900 to use for any kind of health insurance, or if the stipend will pay only for QualChoice insurance. Also, the University must decide if its coverage will increase as insurance premiums increase or if the stipend will remain at $900.
Both of these potential stipulations could be damaging to the administration's proposal because they restrict the benefits to graduate students, McGuinn said.
Graduate students will voice their concerns over this and other health care issues today at the Lawn rally. They could get a boost from Casteen, who as of yesterday had not written his speech, but did say that the issue of giving graduate students health care subsidies "could well fit in as examples of issues we hope to address this year"
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