October 18, 2021 Fall Grad Guide

The University of Maryland’s Independent Student Newspaper

the diamondback

graduate student guide 2021

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Letter

editor’s letter Dear reader, For many, schooling goes well beyond three or four years at a college or university. At the University of Maryland, graduate students navigate their way through classes, living arrangements and the dayto-day challenges of college life just like undergraduate students do.

With ongoing debates over housing developments, an active Graduate Student Government and assistantships to acquire, there’s a lot graduate students at this university need to know.

In order to help future students learn about the graduate student experience, as well as to assist current graduate students in navigating through life at this university, The Diamondback created this Graduate Student Guide.

In these pages, you’ll find deadlines for prospective graduate students, as well as stories discussing issues affecting graduate students at this university, such as stipends and affordable housing.

There’s so much to keep up with, so allow us to fill you in.

Angela Mecca Editor in Chief Graduate Student Guide Editor

Founded 1910, independent since 1971.

ANGELA MECCA Editor in chief 3150 S. Campus Dining Hall, College Park, Md., 20742 (301) 314-8200 https://dbknews.com/contact-us/ THE DIAMONDBACK: Job openings: https://dbknews.com/jobs/ Newsletter: https://ter.ps/DBKNL FIND US ON SOCIAL MEDIA:

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contents

Table of Contents

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graduate student academic deadlines

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Graduate Student Housing: EcoGrads

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students discuss stipend struggles autumn hengen/the diamondback

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deadlines

Academic Deadlines fall 2021

SPRING 2022

Nov. 12

Feb. 4

March 1

Feb. 18

April 19

Final date for doctoral students to submit dissertation to the office of the registrar.

Dec. 1

Final date for graduate students to submit thesis to the office of the registrar.

Dec. 13

Final date for post-baccalaureate certificate, graduate and doctoral students to apply for graduation.

Final date for doctoral students to submit the nomination of dissertation committee form to the office of the registrar.

Final date for graduate students to complete non-thesis requirements for their program.

Final date for graduate students to submit the nomination of thesis committee form to the office of the registrar.

Final date for doctoral students to submit dissertation to the office of the registrar.

April 26

Final date for graduate students to submit thesis to the office of the registrar.

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5

housing

ecograds could bring affordable and sustainable graduate housing With few options beyond Graduate Hills and Graduate Gardens, this complex could be part of a solution.

By Khushboo Rathore and Shreya Vuttaluru | @kboorath and @shreyavut_ | Staff writers

The construction site site for new graduate student housing on Sept. 29, 2021. joe ryan/the diamondback Developers are in the early planning stages for EcoGrads, an apartment complex at the intersection of Route 1 and Quebec Street that, if approved, could offer a beacon of affordability for University of Maryland graduate students who have long voiced concerns over the city’s pricey housing market.

The project plan, which would sit on a lot across from Taco Bell, would be developed by Manzoco Construction. It plans to add about 470 beds in micro-units that are smaller than traditional apartments, priced below the market rate. Real estate developer Mark Manzo plans to submit the proposal to the Prince George’s County planning board before Thanksgiving, according to an email.

Manzo is hoping these nearly 600-square-foot units can meet the needs of graduate students. The units will prioritize graduate students and researchers at this university while promoting sustainability.

“My motive is to solve the problems of the community and to try to make people happy,” Manzo said.

The proposed location will only have 60 parking spots, which Manzo hopes would promote carpooling. There will also be electric shuttle service to this university and a new bike lane right in front of the development, according to Jeremy Feldman, a consulting engineer and former university graduate student.

In order to offer the apartments at more affordable rates, the developers will have to build higher than current zoning laws allow—just under the Federal Aviation Administration limit, Feldman said.

Feldman, a former systems engineering master’s student who graduated in 2017, related to the struggles that students face in finding less expensive housing.

“Grad students don’t have any more money than undergrads,” Feldman said. “Housing is expensive.”

Autumn Perkey, the legislative affairs vice president for the Graduate Student Government, is hesitantly supportive of the development. It seems to have come out of nowhere, she said. The GSG is working on another housing project, a partnership with Gilbane, that they are hoping to get approved.

Perkey has been a vocal advocate for affordable, local graduate student housing. The current options in Graduate Gardens and Graduate Hills are often problematic for students. Perkey has heard about insects and lease violations, among other things.

The GSG’s Executive Board is set to meet with Manzo to get more information about the development.

Manzo found the site in an urban infill zone — undeveloped land that sits in an existing community — and was quick to act on it. The site was an extremely lucky find, he said.

Manzo also hopes to promote art in the area with a jazz and a basement lounge in the development, he said.

Terry Schum, the city of College Park planning director, doesn’t know that the project would be feasible, particularly with limited parking on the lot, zoning regulations and the smaller size of units.

“The parking and the height and the overall density of the project are going to scare a lot of people,” Schum said. “Really it represents over building the site.”

Schum believes that the community would need to rally behind the development in order for the Prince George’s County planning board to approve an exception for the height limit. University View also faced similar zoning hurdles, but was ultimately approved because of community support, Schum said.

Manzo has been working on connecting with stakeholders to ensure that the project goes smoothly.

“Many of them have already expressed support, they’re excited about it,” he said.

Feldman also thinks that the micro-units won’t be a deterrent for students looking for housing, especially given the low price point.

“People can live more efficiently in smaller spaces,” Feldman said. “Current trends are open to smaller spaces that are efficiently designed.”

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stipends

UMD graduate students say their stipends make it hard to stay afloat financially Some students have struggled to find affordable housing and live comfortably.

By Shifra Dayak | @shifradayak | Staff writer When Autumn Perkey arrived at the University of Maryland to start her government and politics doctorate program in 2019, she had just left an abusive relationship in Ohio.

She had her two young kids with her and had to support them while studying.

But her starting stipend was only about $17,000 each year — barely enough to support herself in College Park, let alone her kids, she said.

“It was brutal, there’s no good way to sugarcoat it,” Perkey said.

Graduate students at this university have been vocal about their displeasure with the stipends they receive from their doctorate programs. Coupled with the higher-than-average cost of living in the Washington, D.C., area and housing insecurity issues, the current stipend levels have left

some struggling to stay afloat financially.

According to data last winter from Fearless Student Employees — a campus organization that advocates for legally recognizing graduate students as university employees and giving them the right to unionize — the average annual cost-of-living at this university was around $35,000.

For the 2022 fiscal year, the minimum stipend at this university for graduate students who hold a nine-month assistantship is just over $18,340. The minimum for a nine-and-a-half-month assistantship is $19,349, and the minimum for a 12-month assistantship is $24,453.

There is no cap on stipends, and they increase as graduate students make their way through their respective programs, according to a memo from this university. The universi-

ty hopes to raise minimum stipends in future fiscal years, the memo said.

In a statement provided by this university, Steve Fetter, the associate provost and dean of the graduate school, said the minimum stipend for graduate students is above the cost of attendance, including living expenses.

The statement also included a chart showing minimum stipends at this university were higher than those at seven other Big Ten public universities. The numbers were not adjusted for cost-of-living at each university.

Despite these assertions from the university, some graduate students say the money they are currently receiving does not reflect the amount of work they put in.

“The compensation does not really reflect the amount of work and the role that teaching and research assistants have in

our departments,” said Florian Gawehns, a doctoral student in the government and politics department. “Often they do some of the most important work.”

Effect on everyday lifestyle Perkey received a $5,000 scholarship during the first year of her program. But to prolong that money and her stipend, she had to forgo essentials.

She often ate free food from departmental events so she could use her money to get groceries for her kids, she said, and rarely bought herself essentials.

“My first year in graduate school, I wouldn’t go buy new shoes because I was concerned that if I did, I wouldn’t have money to buy [my kids] shoes,” Perkey said.

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stipends

Florian Gawehns poses for a portrait on Sept. 13, 2021. autumn hengen/the diamondback applied for benefits such as food stamps and Medicaid to cover some costs for herself and her children.

But to get here, she had to pick up multiple extra loads of work. In addition to taking classes for her degree and working as a research assistant for two professors, she is also a teaching assistant for a graduate class.

She also serves as the Graduate Student Government’s vice president of legal affairs and speaker of the assembly.

All in all, she works about 80 hours a week, she said.

Perkey said removing fees for doctoral students would help alleviate the burden.

Graduate students don’t have athletics and largely don’t use Shuttle-UM buses, among other things, so they should not have to pay for those, she said.

“We’re paying $1,000 right off the getgo,” Perkey said. “Our first paycheck goes into fees and we can’t opt in or opt out.”

Other doctoral students have financial support to help alleviate some of the burden.

Yet, some of them say their stipends are still low and the costs of day-to-day life can still blindside them.

Gawehns splits everyday costs such as rent and groceries with his wife, which helps lighten the load, he said.

However, last year, he had to get unexpected dental work done, which his stipend — $770 every two weeks, after taxes and health insurance are removed — could not cover. He had to ask his family members for money, which was “not so great,” he said.

“It’s really hard … saving for something like a vacation or a trip somewhere or something like that,” he said.

The struggle to find housing For many graduate students, finding affordable, livable housing proves to be incredibly difficult — and lacking stipends can

make the housing search even more arduous.

When Perkey first arrived, she had little success finding a place to live in College Park. The high cost was new to her — in Ohio, she paid a $700 mortgage payment each month for a four bedroom, three bathroom house.

One of her options close to the campus was an apartment in Berwyn Heights where the rent was $1,700 a month for two bedrooms.

“People were packed in like sardines,” she said. “It wasn’t going to work for my kids.”

Wanting a more stable, comfortable environment, Perkey decided to search elsewhere, eventually landing in Columbia.

While commuting each day is an added stressor, she said, paying $1,600 a month for a three-bedroom, two-bathroom apartment is preferable to options closer to the campus.

Most graduate students have to live with roommates to afford rent. Gregory Kramida, a doctoral student in the computer science department, has moved around and lived with seven different people while working on his degree, he said.

Tamara Allard, a doctoral student in the psychology department and the GSG president, moved to Columbia this year.

Last year, Allard lived with her fiance in Baltimore. While the commute was 45 minutes, the rent — $1,500 a month for a three-bedroom apartment, split with her fiance — was more affordable with her stipend than anything graduate students could find closer to College Park, she said.

She has heard from fellow students who opted to live in cheap housing in the area that their rooms have mold, cockroaches and bedbugs, she said.

For some, finding a safe place to stay isn’t the end of the struggle. Many graduates only have 9 month or 9-and-a-half month assistantships or fellowships. When they don’t

Tamara Allard poses for a portrait on Sept. 13, 2021. autumn hengen/the diamondback receive stipend money during the summer, they struggle to cover rent.

This past summer, Allard got a dean’s fellowship from the university. But the fellowship is only $2,500, so for people who pay over $1,000 in rent each month, it does not go very far, she said. To support herself, she took on a teaching assistantship for the summer term. “[It] would be amazing … if I could just sit and just focus on my research for a summer, but it just wasn’t an option for me,” Allard said.

The Western Gateway project, a planned graduate housing development near Domain College Park, is set to deliver about 300 units of graduate student housing, plus some townhomes.

But some community members and environmental activists are staunchly opposed to the project, which is being led by Gilbane Development Company. The opposition is part of a movement called Save Guilford Woods, which says environmental harms to the existing green space on the proposed Western Gateway site outweigh the benefits of more housing.

“Could [Gilbane] be pushed further to make this project even more sustainable?

Absolutely,” Allard said. “But already, it’s going to be doing a lot of good for the campus, the biggest [thing] being that it would bring more students closer to campus … so theoretically people would be traveling less into campus.”

Could unionization lead to change?

Graduate students at University System of Maryland institutions are prohibited from unionizing. Supporters of unionization, though, think it could be the key to pressuring the university into raising their stipends.

“The university would be forced, we feel, to treat us somewhat like actual employees

in the private sector,” Kramida said.

Kramida is the standing president of Fearless Student Employees, which has been a leading force for giving graduate students the right to unionize.

The efforts have faced pushback from administration, Kramida said — higher-ups have consistently testified before the Maryland General Assembly against giving graduate students collective bargaining rights.

In his statement, Fetter said creating a union for graduate students would be “unfair to future generations of students” who would not have a say in whether they want a union.

This year, a bill to give graduate students in state institutions collective bargaining rights did not make it past the Senate committee stage in the Maryland General Assembly. The GSG is trying to find out why, Perkey said.

Measures to get collective bargaining rights for graduate student employees go as far back as 2002. More recently, collective bargaining bills were introduced in the General Assembly in 2017, 2018 and 2019. None of them were passed by both chambers.

Fetter said collective bargaining advocates have called for stipends that are more than $36,000 a year. Accommodating this would require state funds or tuition costs to increase, and if those increases do not happen, doctorate programs would have to shrink, he said.

Moving forward, graduate students hope people pay attention to their calls for change.

“We have to have more power in this conversation to be able to raise the stipends,” Allard said. “That’s why we’ve pushed so hard for that, because it feels like the only thing we have.”