Dear Chancellor Larive, Campus Provost/EVC Kletzer, and President Napolitano,
Throughout this campaign, graduate students have given testimony of their experiences trying to survive in Santa Cruz on the inadequate wages and funding we receive from this institution.
We want to give voice to these anonymous accounts to illustrate to administration and faculty how dire our situation really is. We also hope that by sharing these unedited stories, graduate students will realize that they are not alone in these experiences:
“My husband and I knew that moving to Santa Cruz would be expensive. We were prepared for it. But we are on our third apartment in three years because of legal loopholes and/or bullying by landlords, which we did not pursue in court because the costs would have outweighed the payout. We have kept detailed records of all our housing challenges, including one instance where we had to speak to a lawyer and install security cameras. Furthermore, we had instances where prospective landlords knew our old landlords socially, and we had to be careful about burning bridges.
In looking for apartments three years in a row, we have seen the same housing stock come up year after year in our searches. Between 2017 and 2019, the same apartments went up $200-500 per month. We are fortunate to have a tech salary in our family, and even with that we pay more than 30% of our combined income on rent. We live in a one bedroom, share one car, take public transportation, and minimize eating out, but even with all that we are having difficulty affording Santa Cruz while saving for our family and supporting aging parents. Again, we knew, to an extent, what we were getting into. But we expected the university to make at least a good faith effort to keep up with rising costs of living.
I have worked in non-profits and academia for 10 years. I did not expect a big payday. I am happy to do work ‘for free’ as long as I am paid enough to survive. (As a side note, it was easier and more affordable to live in New York City – in Manhattan – as a graduate student and adjunct faculty than it is in Santa Cruz). But in every environment where I’ve been underpaid and overworked, an issue like this has inevitably come up. I and my colleagues have been spoken down to and assumed to be incapable of understanding the bigger picture. That I was prepared for, even willing to engage with. I wouldn’t say that I have a strong history of activism – I’m more comfortable working through institutional channels. But what has stood out in this instance is the complete lack of engagement by the administration. Condescension is better than no engagement at all.
While I haven’t always agreed with the COLA campaign’s tactics, Quentin Williams’ 12/10 email was insulting and incompetent. Coupled with a video of VC Kletzer on the COLA social media pages saying that she ‘did not dispute that [graduate student financial precarity] was our perspective’ solidified my support with the COLA campaign. Here there has been no attempt to help us understand the larger financial challenges facing the university or unpack how paying graduate students more for their work clashes with other financial needs. Furthermore, this is a university that prides itself on its social justice activism and radical approach to politics, among other issues. In some ways we shouldn’t be surprised by the administration’s response, given VC Kletzer’s stance on labor politics in her own work (https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/PB73.pdf).
Nevertheless, the administration’s inability to rise above what it sees as the narrow, immature, and hyperbolic demands of the graduate student population speaks volumes about its leadership abilities. At this point I need a COLA to keep faith in this institution I’ve chosen to work for as much as to relieve my own financial hardships. Show us we made the right choice by putting our faith in UCSC and coming here. Solidarity with COLA.”
These stories aren’t novel or surprising to most of us. And they shouldn’t be surprising to administration, who have completed multiple assessments of graduate student wellbeing. Administrators have ignored and dismissed their own findings, which demonstrate that it is impossible to survive on our stipends in Santa Cruz. We will not be ignored. We will not be dismissed. We will not wait. We will not submit.