Just 13 students showed up to the Graduate and Professional School Council's forum on proposed fee increases Monday, but they had tough questions for Dean of the Graduate School Lewis Siegel.
"I'm pleased we were able to do this," said Elayne Heisler, GPSC president and third-year graduate student in sociology. "They can take that opportunity or not, but we ought to give them that opportunity."
Several students questioned the Graduate School's lack of support for about 140 students past their fifth year of study. But Siegel pointed out that the three past GPSC presidents ranked supporting those students as less important than raising stipends and funding summer research.
He said the Graduate School has tried to increase this funding and suggested that students take their concerns to President Nan Keohane and Provost Peter Lange.
"She's the one who can go to a donor and say, OThis is what Duke needs,'" Siegel said.
He said although Arts and Sciences pays the teaching assistant budget, the Graduate School's fees provide stipends and other support for Arts and Sciences graduate students.
"We're subsidizing Trinity College," he said. "They don't look at it that way, but we do."
Some students also complained about the way fees are handled, since the Graduate School subsidizes students' fees in addition to their teaching stipends. Students must then pay the fees back to the University. International students said they have a tough time because they must pay taxes on these fees since they receive them as income.
Siegel responded that the school had researched separating the fees from the stipends, but concluded that dividing the two would be too difficult.
Siegel spent the first 45 minutes of the forum explaining the Graduate School's plan to increase tuition and fees by 11 percent per year over the next three years.
However, most graduate students do not have to pay tuition, and the increase for those master's students who do pay will be significantly less than 11 percent a year.
Students in the Graduate School also have to pay registration and other fees, which will increase from about $2,700 to $3,700. But most graduate students' grants also cover some or all of these fees. And since the Graduate School commits to support doctoral students in their first five years, sixth-year students and beyond will sometimes be left paying those fees.
Without these tuition and fee increases, which still must be approved by the Board of Trustees, the Graduate School would face a deficit of between $1 million and $1.5 million. The increases will reduce the deficit to between $500,000 and $600,000, which will be covered by money from Arts and Sciences and the capital campaign.
The deficit is a result of the University's increased support to graduate students. Siegel noted that the three programs responsible for the deficit--increasing stipends from $13,000 to $14,000, providing a limited number of $5,500 summer fellowships and allowing more support for sixth-year graduate students--have allowed Duke to become more competitive with its peer institutions.
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