Student activists gathered outside Bricker Hall yesterday to rally for increased health care coverage for graduate student employees.
The Graduate Employees and Students Organization gathered about 1,800 signatures on a petition to increase the amount of health care subsidy provided by Ohio State.
“The university subsidizes our health insurance at 42 percent,” said Michael Meagher, a GESO activist and teaching assistant in the Department of Mathematics. “This is a long way behind other Big Ten schools.”
The universities of Michigan, Minnesota and Indiana all subsidize their graduate assistant health insurance at 100 percent. Other Big Ten universities subsidize at least 80 percent.
Larry Lewellen, associate vice president of human resources at OSU, said the university acknowledges there are problems with the health care subsidy provided to the graduate employees.
“I know we don’t agree on the pace of things,” Lewellen said as about 30 GESO members handed him their petitions. “We all know we are behind on health care; this is not a new issue.”
Lewellen said a three-year plan was issued to the Council of Graduate Students on Oct. 31 to raise the health care subsidy from 42 percent to 66 percent.
According to the three-year plan, the contribution graduate associates make will be frozen at $200 per quarter. Lewellen said this means no matter how much health care costs increase, graduate students will never have to contribute more than $200 per quarter.
The plan was sent to the entire university electronically via the Buckeye Net News on Sunday, but GESO activists said they are not satisfied.
“On some levels that is a victory for us; it shows we have put pressure on them,” said Alistair Fraser, a GESO activist and teaching assistant in the department of geography. “On another level it is a defeat.”
GESO petitions were asking OSU to raise the subsidy to 50 percent by autumn 2004 and 100 percent by 2005.
“We know this doesn’t match GESO’s desires, and certainly the CGS would like to have a faster plan as well,” Lewellen said. “We also know the graduate associates are very important to the university, and the amount of economic support we supply them has to be competitive.”
CGS President Jamie Depelteau said this plan is a step in the right direction, but it is not exactly what the CGS was looking for either.
“We have passed two resolutions and one of them calls for 100 percent subsidy of student health insurance in the next five years,” Depelteau said. “This is such an important topic because it is part of our benefits package, and many comparative institutions include 100 percent coverage.”
OSU has made progress over the past three years increasing the health care subsidy.
Three years ago the university did not subsidize health care insurance for graduate employees. Since then, the subsidy has been raised from nothing to $150 per quarter.
Ohio Federation of Teacher President Tom Mooney, along with Rep. Dan Stewart, D-Columbus, and Sen. Ray Miller, D-Columbus, spoke in support of GESO at the rally.
“It is a statewide problem – the treatment of graduate employees and adjunct faculty, who teach a majority of the undergraduate curriculum,” Mooney said. “I use the term ‘intellectual sweatshops.’ As long as this cheap labor is available, the universities will use it.”
