March 28, 2022
Over the last five weeks, we have been meeting with graduate students in each school or college to hear from students directly about their experiences at IU Bloomington. I appreciate how quickly each of you organized these meetings and invited Vice President James Wimbush, Vice Provost for Graduate Education David Daleke, and myself to meet with your students. I am sorry I could not personally attend all of them, but between us I think we were able to attend all of these meetings. I am also grateful that Vice Provost David Daleke meets biweekly with the GPSG elected representatives—and has met regularly with them for many years. From his work with these students, and from these public student listening sessions, we heard insightful comments about SAA compensation and tuition waivers, mandatory fees, health insurance plans, SAA workload, parking fees, research and teaching resources, mental health support, and career and professional development, among other areas.
Over the last several weeks we have been studying these issues, and I am writing to share three important updates, all to take effect July 1, 2022.
- Student Academic Appointments (SAAs) will receive a 5% stipend increase on FY21 rates
- Student Academic Appointments (SAAs) will have a minimum stipend rate of $18,000/.50FTE/10-month appointment*
- University-funded tuition remission can be used for any IU course, regardless of department or school, officially approved in the student’s program of study
We will continue to study the additional items mentioned by graduate and professional students and will take further steps to continue improving the quality of graduate education at IU Bloomington. We are competing for the best graduate students in the world and these are important first steps toward improving our competitiveness.
Please distribute this message to all chairs, program directors, or department directors that supervise SAAs, or who have faculty or staff members that supervise SAAs.
*Except for SAAs in Residential Programs and Services whose total compensation may include stipend, room and board, tuition remission, and health insurance, which far exceeds the campus average total compensation for SAAs.
Thank you,
Rahul Shrivastav
Provost and Executive Vice President