Miami University AAUP condemns University of California–Santa Cruz’s cruel decision to fire 54 striking graduate students. We salute the brave graduate students at University of California–Santa Cruz, whose strike for fair pay and fair treatment has inspired graduate students all over California to stand up and demand cost-of-living adjustments (COLAs) to help them survive the crisis in affordable housing.
Santa Cruz is one of the most expensive housing markets in the country. Graduate students spend 50-70% of their small 9-month stipends on rent. Some are homeless. Now, rather than advocating for the striking students as humans in real and desperate need of help, high-paid administrators have cut off their sole source of support.
Miami University graduate students are almost as rent-burdened as California students, spending an average of 42% of their small stipends on housing and receiving no health insurance benefits. They deserve better.
Miami AAUP also stands in solidarity with the 39 staff members recently laid off at Miami. Efficiency and good stewardship of resources are values to be applauded. But when the salary of the Miami football coach alone ($520,746) could pay the salaries of at least twenty laid-off staff, “good stewardship” is not the phrase that comes to mind.
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