On Monday graduate students met to discuss unionizing, using outside insurance agencies and working with administrators as possible means of reversing effects of a 45 percent health insurance cost increase slated for next year.
Sixty graduate students crowded into Norris University Center’s North Louis Room, galvanized by a shared opposition to the proposed insurance hike, which would raise insurance costs for graduate students from $812 to $1,184.
“We need to tell the university, ‘This situation is intolerable,'” said Judith Alexander, a religion graduate student. “We don’t need to be angry, we just need to inform them.”
Tom Noerper, a psychology graduate student, suggested that graduate students unionize to better lobby against higher insurance costs, as well as other grievances graduate students hold.
“(Unionizing) gives us a stronger position to deal with issue in an ongoing basis,” Noerper said. “It might not help as much with this short-term goal, but this issue will persist.”
Several graduate students in the audience murmured in agreement when Noerper first spoke, and two students mentioned striking. Some graduate students said the threat of their unionizing would make administrators more willing to compromise on an agreement about the health insurance problem.
Graduate Student Association President Vandna Sinha said she was excited by the large turnout, and she was happy that people were making constructive suggestions at the meeting.
“I was impressed there was such interest in the issues and a willingness to think about them in a deep and meaningful way,” said Sinha, an education graduate student.
Sinha moderated the meeting, balancing talk about long-term goals such as unionization with short-term solutions to the insurance issue.
The group lauded a suggestion by Graduate School Dean Richard Morimoto for NU to cover all graduate students’ health insurance by 2003. But students said they still wanted to research other solutions if that plan falls through, including dropping out of the university’s insurance plan and joining private insurance plans.
The students decided at the end of the meeting to draft a petition urging Morimoto to continue his efforts to take care of graduate students’ insurance. They also decided to form committees to research outside insurance vendors, look into unionization and work with administrators, including Morimoto and Risk Management Director Chris Johnson.
The health insurance increase would go into effect next year and also would raise undergraduate insurance from $608 to $889. Graduate students expressed discontent throughout the meeting that they were forced to pay more than undergraduates for the same coverage.
They also were upset that they had not heard whether their stipends would increase to meet the new health insurance costs, even though Rebecca Dixon, associate provost for university enrollment, already had said undergraduate financial aid would increase to meet the change.
Administrators said that at least some graduate students’ aid would be increased to meet the new rate. Effie Barnett, director of financial aid for NU’s Chicago campus, said students in graduate law, medical and physical therapy programs would be protected against the increase.
Financial aid officials from graduate schools on Evanston’s campus could not be reached for comment.