UC Santa Cruz fires 54 grad students who were striking for higher pay • Hacker News Board

Re: UC Santa Cruz fires 54 grad students who were striking for higher pay

#381

Post by svaigsq » Mon, Mar 02, 2020, 12:23 PM UTC

papeda wrote: post #108

There are about 1800 UCSC graduate students [1]. From this 2014-15 UCSC budget report [2] there is a very near 2:1 masters:phd graduation ratio. Assuming there are 2 years of masters students and 6 of PhD at any one time, that makes PhD students 60% of “graduate students”. Let’s make this easy by saying 1000 PhD students (if anything I imagine it’s way less than this — as I understand, monetizing masters students has…

There are even more questions if all of those 1000 PhD students receive pay(not the money they receive to support their research, which is not the same thing) from UC. But I assume that is not the case, that ALL PhD students are employed by UC... or is it? And why only 54 of those students feel that they are special?

I am confused and a bit curious, because that is not why I went to uni(not in US) and not how I had to deal with my studies. Also - can a foreign student apply for this free cheese and is UC diploma any good(also - outside UC, to have a real job)? And how UC is getting money? Any tax money involved(if that is the case, then why?) or only donations - from former students, who... work at UC?

Re: UC Santa Cruz fires 54 grad students who were striking for higher pay

#382

Post by PeterStuer » Mon, Mar 02, 2020, 12:25 PM UTC

metaphor wrote: post #343

pkaye wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In college, a professor recommended me for an academic award from industry. It was $1000. So I go to the yearly awards dinner and a month later got a check for $800. Apparently the university takes a 20% as administrative cost!

Imagine how this team[1] felt when the University of Florida screwed them over not only a $750K preliminary prize (that would have been applied towards funding the next year's research agenda) but a subsequent $2MM prize for taking 1st place in DARPA's Spectrum Collaboration Challenge. [1] https://www.alligator.org/news/uf-engineering-team-wins-mill...

Seriously?

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We recognize you are attempting to access this website from a country belonging to the European Economic Area (EEA) including the EU which enforces the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and therefore access cannot be granted at this time. For any issues, contact webmaster@alligator.org or call 352-376-4458. "

Re: UC Santa Cruz fires 54 grad students who were striking for higher pay

#383

Post by willis936 » Mon, Mar 02, 2020, 12:27 PM UTC

chrisseaton wrote: post #37

rumanator wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately a PhD is sold as a key step for a well-paying and fulfilling career where you can make a difference. As we live in a society where education is fundamental to success and having a good life, a PhD is considered as the last and most exclusive step in a promising career path. But then the disappointing part is that the system in place is designed to exploit newcomers and place them in an abuse relationshi…

But you don’t have to work for the university while you do your PhD if you don’t want to. I didn’t - I worked for a company instead. Maybe if the university had paid more I’d have worked for it instead.

Yes, you do. I work as an engineer in a research group of a top 10 US graduate research university. I am exposed to many different groups. No group will take you if you are not working for them at ludicrously low pay. You can’t get a PhD if you’re not a part of a group. You either find one that will take you within a year or you leave.

Re: UC Santa Cruz fires 54 grad students who were striking for higher pay

#384

Post by willis936 » Mon, Mar 02, 2020, 12:31 PM UTC

asdff wrote: post #51

RijilV wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s no shortage of folks being sold “key steps” to high paying jobs. Maybe their meter stick is different from yours, but taking that job as the night attendant at the hotel to move up the ranks or getting a salaried position as an assistant manager at Burger King as a path to a regional manager. Lots of folks trying to sell you a path to success.

It's not like that. If you want to be hired as a staff scientist, you need a PhD. If you have an MS you can't be a staff scientist. If you have a BS you can't be a staff scientist. The most you'd get with those degrees is Research Assistant or Technician, then you will hit a ceiling in your career unless you step away from research and step more into business. This is true in academia, government labs, and the privat…

I face this unfortunate reality. I am simply not rich enough to get a PhD. I am certainly capable and willing. So instead I work as a tech in a research group of something that interests me for wage that is still too low for my capabilities.

Re: UC Santa Cruz fires 54 grad students who were striking for higher pay

#385

Post by willis936 » Mon, Mar 02, 2020, 12:34 PM UTC

raverbashing wrote: post #361

rumanator wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately a PhD is sold as a key step for a well-paying and fulfilling career where you can make a difference. As we live in a society where education is fundamental to success and having a good life, a PhD is considered as the last and most exclusive step in a promising career path. But then the disappointing part is that the system in place is designed to exploit newcomers and place them in an abuse relationshi…

> a PhD is sold as a key step for a well-paying and fulfilling career where you can make a difference Yes, it is sold as such. But the appeal is fading fast. Academia nowadays is something between a Beauty Pageant and the Hunger Games where people struggle with underpayment for years for maybe one day getting the famed tenured position.

Nobody in graduate school has delusions of expecting a professorship. It is well known that professorships are hard to get and involve a lot of politics. Graduate students don’t have bright prospects and are given a bad financial situation, but do it all the same because that’s the only way to work on something gratifying or important. It seems insane to punish the most talented and passionate for pursuing their calling.

Re: UC Santa Cruz fires 54 grad students who were striking for higher pay

#386

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Mar 02, 2020, 12:49 PM UTC

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #379

wahern wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Compulsory union membership has been illegal since the 1947 Taft-Hartey Act. Compulsory legal representation fees for public sector unions have been illegal since Janus v. AFSCME (2018). Just like in a democracy, not everybody's interests can be fully satisfied in a union. So what? That doesn't necessarily mean we'd all be better off with autocracy or without any government whatsoever, not even the people getting the…

Unions still have many monopolistic legal rights. For example, one obvious question is why UCSC students can’t form their own union and get their own contract; the answer is that it would be illegal, because if there’s a duly authorized union employers can’t collectively bargain with any other group.

[deleted]

Re: UC Santa Cruz fires 54 grad students who were striking for higher pay

#387

Post by PeterStuer » Mon, Mar 02, 2020, 12:50 PM UTC

daly wrote: post #2

I lived on 54 cent pancakes covered in free butter and honey, 9 cents per can baked beans (turns out I don't like baked beans, I like good sauce which this was not), and candy bars out of a broken and never fixed candy machine. I don't recommend it. I weighed 110 pounds by the time I left. All of my money went to dorm housing (paid to the school). Later when I was a researcher I found out that the Provost takes 55% o…

Can you provide more detail? Usually grants/projects etc in research in Europe explicitly budget "overheads" as a separate budget line. The size ove the overhead varies between the different funding instruments, but are usually between 20% and 100% of the direct costs (mostly wages). Universities will have internal regimes that distribute the overheads between the central administration, for covering such things as office space, heating, shared services etc., and the research group in which the research takes place for covering computing, office supplies, local admin, travels, publication consumables etc.

So for example a 2 year project that has 120K allocated in direct cost salary, with a 75% overhead regime in a university with a 25% central overhead take would have an overall budget of 210K of which 120K would end up payed as salary to the researchers, 52.5K taken by central administration, and 37.5K taken by the research group.

While technically you could argue paying researchers more would also net the university more money, asthe overheads are calculated as a % on direct costs, in reality this does not hold as funding for research is very finite and funding agencies would not approve paying higher project grants.

Both universities and large businesses have been successfully lobbying for years for higher overhead % regimes in grant instruments, and since the budget for funding research has not changed in line with these evolutions, defaco shifting the windfalls of research grants from the researcher's wages to the administrations.

Re: UC Santa Cruz fires 54 grad students who were striking for higher pay

#388

Post by davrosthedalek » Mon, Mar 02, 2020, 1:05 PM UTC

saagarjha wrote: post #339

kortilla wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> UCSC can easily marshal the resources to get your grades Unless UCSC is hiring water boarding specialists, no they can’t. The TA refused to give them up.

What would the college have done if the TA had decided to quit?

What would the college have done if 54 TAs had quit... It's much easier to fix one missing TA, be redoing the grading work if necessary, than for 54. And if a TA quits, I would expect the TA to release the grades as far as they have been determined at the point of quitting.

Re: UC Santa Cruz fires 54 grad students who were striking for higher pay

#389

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Mar 02, 2020, 1:13 PM UTC

papeda wrote: post #108

There are about 1800 UCSC graduate students [1]. From this 2014-15 UCSC budget report [2] there is a very near 2:1 masters:phd graduation ratio. Assuming there are 2 years of masters students and 6 of PhD at any one time, that makes PhD students 60% of “graduate students”. Let’s make this easy by saying 1000 PhD students (if anything I imagine it’s way less than this — as I understand, monetizing masters students has…

[deleted]

Re: UC Santa Cruz fires 54 grad students who were striking for higher pay

#390

Post by zdragnar » Mon, Mar 02, 2020, 1:20 PM UTC

cardiffspaceman wrote: post #296

scarmig wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the legal level, unions are obligated to prevent wildcat strikes. That's why people talk about a grand bargain between labor and capital happening mid century: unions would channel labor conflict into a bureaucratic process, and in return capital would agree in principle to negotiate with the union. In practice, union bureaucrats really dislike wildcat strikes. They dissipate the negotiating power of the union; th…

I wonder if the union seriously considered a strike or not. I read the article but I missed anything that indicated deliberation over the striker's cause on the part of the union. In the grand bargain the union has to refrain from merging with management or else it is illegitimate.

Why would the union strike? The wages were exactly what they had bargained for, and the majority had voted in favor of. It isn't like they were working without a contract.