Alisha, I am a PhD student at New Mexico State University and my advisors always found a way to provide me with a private office space (that I had to share with only another student), travel money, or anything else I needed along the way so I consider myself very lucky in that respect. However, NMSU does not provide a tuition waiver to grad students and we have to come up with it.
I personally think that cramming 40 people in one room, is unproductive, unethical, and maybe even unsafe (depending on the capacity of the room). I would say it is unusual but I am curious to see if there are other people in such situation. We have a computer lab with maybe ten computers and when there are more than 5 students working there, there is always chatting and distractions so I cannot imagine how it would be with 40. If I were you I would try to gather all the grad students and discuss the issue bringing up all the pros and cons and then I would try to have a faculty meeting to find a solution. There must be a health and safety department in your institution, I would also try to talk about them about your health concerns (mold, ventilation etc.). I would not ignore safety issues (i.e. fire hazards, how many doors are in that room?) Good Luck. Andrea > Alisha, > As an abd PhD student I sympathize with your situation. I would like to > see > my department function without the graduate student population, as they > teach many of the classes, produce the majority of the first-author > publications, write many of the funding grants, and even take on the > peer-review responsibilities of their advisers. On the food-chain of > university politics, however, graduate students are very clearly on the > bottom. Part of this is justifiable, as we are generally earning a > stipend > plus free tuition and health insurance, which is not an insubstantial sum. > Having written some funding grants, I've become aware of just how much it > costs to keep me around! > > The part that is often underestimated, however, is that the quality of any > department is 1) dependent on the quality of the faculty, yes, but 2) also > dependent on the quality of the graduate students. As a guy that had > options, I came to my present school for three main reasons: 1) I liked my > adviser and his realm of study 2) I liked the departments commitment to > graduate student funding 3) I liked the graduate student facilities. > Honestly, I would have gone somewhere else if I was introduced to the > situation you describe. > > I suppose I'm not directly answering your question, as I don't know of a > study specifically assessing the "value" of graduate students, and > workloads > and support differ greatly from lab to lab. I've witnessed labs where the > great majority of the "value" being attributed to the faculty member was > being produced by graduate students, and I've witnessed quite the > opposite. > Nonetheless, when a faculty member interviews they always have some common > concerns: what's my salary, how much lab space, what's my start-up. Don't > think that graduate students aren't doing the same thing (I was), and in > my > mind, the reason why the "best" schools are attracting the "best" graduate > students comes down to these fundamental (and rather unscientific) > concerns. > > On Thu, Apr 22, 2010 at 1:34 AM, Alisha Dahlstrom < > [email protected]> wrote: > >> Hi all, >> >> I am currently a phd student in my second year. Currently, within my >> department, grad students share a small building with several rooms, 5-7 >> in >> a room. There is a proposal to uproot all the students (and combine them >> with grad students in a similar department) to a renovated basement that >> is >> currently not being used because it is moldy, has poor ventilation and >> no >> natural lighting. Apart from a few short partitions, this would be a >> large >> shared space that "packed as many students in as possible" (about 40; >> you >> can imagine the potential noise and disruptions). As the grad student >> rep, >> when I explained this to the proponent of this new plan and asked for >> his >> justification, it was that "grad students aren't worth much to a >> university >> (monetarily speaking, at least, undergrads earn a school more) and it >> would >> be nice for visitors to see all the students in one space." >> >> As this plan seems to be moving forward rapidly, I would really like to >> pull >> together some documentation that supports my belief that 1) grad >> students >> will have a higher completion rate and better output in a better (e.g., >> quieter and well-lit) work environment and 2) grad students are actually >> valuable to a university. In my cursory, search, I haven't had much luck >> - >> does anyone have any suggestions or input? Feel free to email me >> directly. >> >> Cheers, >> Alisha >> >
