Personal Finance for PhDs

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Jewel Lipps

This Postbac Fellow Saves 30% of Her Income through Simple Living and a SciComm Side Hustle

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In this episode, Emily interviews Maya Gosztyla, a postbac fellow at the National Institutes of Health in Rockville, MD who saves approximately 30% of her income from her stipend and freelance science writing income. Her goals for funding her PhD program applications and upcoming move to grad school and wedding motivate her to keep her expenses low and sustain her side hustle. Maya gives great financial advice for PhDs in transition into and out of grad school.

Links mentioned in episode

postbac savings rate

0:00 Introduction

1:15 Please Introduce Yourself

Maya Gosztyla graduated in May 2018 from Ohio State. She majored in Neuroscience and Molecular Genetics. She started as a postbac at National Institutes of Health (NIH) right after graduation. She is mainly focused on drug discovery research. Her interests are in neurodegenerative diseases in particular. She is applying to PhD programs, with intent to begin her PhD program in Fall 2019. Maya is relieved that she does not have to balance undergraduate coursework with time spent on graduate applications. She also has more time for the interview weekends, which Emily says can be a fun experience.

2:33 What is your income? Where do you work and live?

Maya’s postbac annual salary is $30,000. She works at NIH location in Rockville, Maryland. The cost of living in this location is fairly high, because she is in the Washington DC metro area.

3:26 What was your financial situation coming into your postbac position?

Maya didn’t have any student loans. She says she treated filling out scholarship applications like a full time job, so she was able to fund her entire junior and senior years of undergraduate education. She didn’t spend all of her scholarship stipend during senior year. She has emergency savings fund of about $7,000 since she graduated from college.

4:25 Do you apply the same mindset from your undergraduate scholarships to your graduate school fellowship applications?

Maya says she has been applying to many graduate school fellowships. She applied to the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program (NSF GRFP), the National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate Fellowship (NDSEG), and one example of a school specific fellowship is the Knight-Hennessy Scholars at Stanford University. In addition to her graduate school applications, she has been sending in many applications to go after award money in full force. Emily assures that this strategy is a great idea, because you are certain that you will get paid for your graduate work.

5:58 Where did you move from? How did you manage your finances during your move?

Maya’s rent during college was $350 per month. In Rockville Maryland, her rent is $850 per month. Maya says what helped her most during her move was making a really detailed budget. She used several cost of living calculator websites. Additionally, she doesn’t have tax withdrawn from her postbac stipend, so she had to estimate quarterly tax.

She was in shock when she moved from the inexpensive Ohio city to the much more expensive DC area. She thought she needed to spend as little as humanly possible. For instance, she first moved into a bedroom in a three bedroom apartment. Her portion of the rent was $700 per month, which is the cheapest she could find in the area. She had an hour long commute, and she had to leave the apartment because of a cockroach infestation. Maya advises that people not to choose the cheapest apartment, but to take into account other factors. She says it can be worth more rent money to be closer to work for a shorter commute, and to live in a quality apartment.

Maya used cost of living calculators to get a sense of the maximum expenses she would have in the DC area. She says she spends less than suggested by the calculators. She talked to people who are in the NIH postbac program, because these are people in her age group and income level. At this early career stage, people are willing to share information about income and rent.

10:04 What is your savings rate? How are you saving this amount each month?

Maya is averaging around 30% of her gross income, pre-tax, going into savings. She emphasizes the importance of setting targets and timelines for what she is saving for. One of her specific goals was to pay for PhD program applications, which was well over $1000. She wanted to start an Individual Retirement Account (IRA), since she’s not sure she can have an IRA while she’s in graduate school. Another financial goal is to get married next summer! With her partner, she wants to take a couple of weeks vacation in Europe. She wants to do all of this without tapping into her emergency fund, because she wants to use this fund for her move to graduate school.

Maya has several frugal strategies. She doesn’t have a car, which is unnecessary in DC and major cities. She takes a bus to work, which she says is reliable. NIH will pay for public transit, so she gets reimbursed for her bus expenses. Maya says eating out is really expensive. She cooks almost all of her meals, and she meal preps. She goes out to eat with friends, as a social experience, it’s important to eat food to bond with people. This happens two to three times a month, and they don’t go out for drinks that much either. She views her eating out expenses as paying for access to space and people, and eating food isn’t the purpose. She set a rule for herself that she won’t eat out alone.

She goes to work, gets groceries, finds free stuff to do, and she doesn’t spend on entertainment. Also, she has a side source of income. Maya does science writing as a freelancer. It’s not easy work, but it’s not incredibly technical. She can pick and choose when and what kind of assignments she wants to accept.

15:27 How did you get connected to opportunities for freelance science writing?

Maya started a blog about Alzheimer’s Disease while she was in college. She wasn’t making money from the blog, but she started getting cold emails from people who liked her writing who would commission her for articles. She uses Upward, the freelancing website to find clients. Upward has a fee of 30% from every writing, so she charges more to make sure she doesn’t undercharge for her work.

Emily recommends the academic blogging network on Facebook (now called Gradblogger Connect) as a great resource for people interested in blogging and podcasts.

She doesn’t see science writing as her career. The variable income makes her feel anxious. She’d like to keep writing on the side, because she believes it is important for scientists to write about research for the public. Emily says that a side hustle during the PhD training is useful to figure out if this is what you want to do for your career.

20:37 Do you consider yourself having a financially quiet life?

Maya says that she applies a KonMari method to her purchases. She asks herself questions like, “will getting take out actually make me happier?” She does spend money on flights, because her fiancé lives in Ohio and she travels to see him. Maya observes that people spend money because they feel like they have to. She says it’s not a sacrifice for her to not go out every weekend, because she doesn’t really like alcohol. Emily says that it’s very interesting to apply Marie Kondo’s method to finances, and ask “does this spark joy?” Maya has gone through the introspection to consider what is bringing her high value. When you have low income, you can’t just default to the kind of consumerism you see around you.

23:30 Have you started thinking about how you’ll financially manage the transition to graduate school?

Maya is applying to high cost of living areas, so she feels more prepared for that move. Since she’s lived in the DC area, she will have a better idea of expense in places like Boston and San Francisco. She’s trying not to touch her emergency fund, because she needs it for her moving expenses. She is also trying to make sure that fiancé and her are comfortable in their current low income lifestyle, she wants to avoid the lifestyle creep. Graduate school will be a transition, but Maya will also experience the life transition of combining her lives with her partner.

25:02 Do you have any advice for someone looking at a transition out of college or into graduate school?

Maya says the first thing you have to do is look at what you have and where do you want to be in a month, or year. There is no way to set a savings rate if you don’t have something you’re aiming for. She gives the example that she wanted to save $4,000 for their honeymoon, then she could create a budget with that goal in mind.

She also says don’t forget about taxes. She had lab mates who didn’t know this. They weren’t setting aside money for tax season, and ended up owing. She says you can set up a separate savings account to set aside taxes. Emily says that this blindsides a lot of people. She has created resources on her website to help people estimate their quarterly tax.

Maya says you need to buy things that actually make you happy. She offers the caveat that if something is actually important, like you don’t need to get the cheapest apartment, get one you want. You can keep stock of what you actually care about. Maya wonders if people really know the taste of expensive wine, for example, or if it’s more about expectations. Emily says we may need to shuck the expectations. You have to figure out if something is right for you, if it “sparks joy” for you, and it’s not an expectation that others put on you. Maya says that others don’t pay attention.

Finally, Maya says to keep a really detailed spreadsheet. She used to use Mint, but now she uses a manual spreadsheet, and inputs once a week. She customizes it for her needs.

30:47 Conclusion

Using Data to Improve the Postdoc Experience (Including Salary and Benefits)

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In this episode, Emily interview Dr. Gary McDowell, the executive director of Future of Research. Future of Research is an advocacy organization that uses data to empower early-career researchers. Gary outlines the ongoing work at Future of Research before diving into the details of their recently published study on postdoc salaries. Emily and Gary discuss the complexities around categorizing and counting postdocs as well as the interesting results from the data Future of Research acquired by Freedom of Information Act requests. Current postdocs can contribute to this ongoing project by submitting their salary and benefits data to the Postdoc Salaries database.

 

Links mentioned in episode

postdoc salaries

0:00 Introduction

1:07 Please Introduce Yourself

Dr. Gary McDowell is from Northern Ireland and Scotland. All of his undergraduate and postgraduate education was completed in the United Kingdom. He moved to the United States to become postdoc. First, he worked at Boston Children’s Hospital, then he worked at Tufts University in the Boston area. As a postdoc in the United States, Gary became interested in the scientific system itself, such as setting scientists up for success and producing scientists, not just science. He experienced the frustration that many people feel with the scientific system and its hyper competition.

Now Gary is the executive director of the nonprofit Future of Research. Their mission is to empower early career researchers with evidence to help them change the research system and the enterprise they experience.

3:00 Can you give us an overview of Future of Research and the organization’s work?

Gary is the only staff member of Future of Research. The board of is comprised of twenty early career researchers. The organization originated with a conference to bring early career researchers together to discuss ways to reduce hyper-competition in biomedicine. They held conferences around the country and realized the need for a group that has these conversations. The nonprofit provides data and evidence to early career researchers to help them make better choices and to educate the rest of scientific community of the realities our generation is currently experiencing. Their work is done by the board and volunteers.

Future of Research has worked on two major projects which came out of local meetings. The project “Who’s on board?” aims to get more early career researchers into leadership positions, starting with scientific societies. Through this project, Future of Research seeks to generate a network of future leaders for scientific organizations to tap into. They are working on a project to address mentoring, because it is one of the biggest concerns of early career researchers. Junior faculty often ask, “How do I find out more about how to mentor and manage people?” Junior faculty are expected to be mentors, but don’t know how to. Future of Research will host a summit in Chicago to bring together people who work in this space and who research mentoring. They will discuss what grassroots action they can take to make sure institutions are putting mentoring at the center of their interests.

Future of Research has been responsive to needs that arise. They are beginning a project to examine peer review and address this phenomenon of grad students and postdocs essentially ghostwriting a peer review report that is then submitted to a journal under someone else’s name. This is a problem of appropriate scholarly recognition, but at the same time the academic community hears there are not enough reviewers. Journals are crying out for more reviewers, but there is lack of transparency about who’s doing reviews, creating barriers to journals having names of potential reviewers. Surveys suggest that principle investigators are not trained in peer review, their practices come from assumptions, and there is generally lack of clarity of expectations in the peer review process.

Future of Research has just finished a postdoc salary project. It started when they formed the nonprofit. At the time, there was a change to federal labor law being proposed. The change was going to affect postdocs by raising their salaries, or by causing institutions to have postdocs clocking in and out and tracking time. Future of Research watched the push to raise postdoc salaries, and started following what institutions would do in response. They had the question about what are the actual salaries that people in postdoc positions have?

8:34 What is your recent paper and where can people find it?

The title of their paper is “Assessing the landscape of U.S. postdoctoral salaries.” It’s open access in the Studies in Graduate and Postdoctoral Education, Emerald Insight Publishing Groups.

9:07 What is a postdoc?

According to Gary, the PhD is when the trainee is learning how to do science, how to carry out research, how to do experiments, and analyze,. The PhD is for learning the nuts and bolts of being a scientist. The postdoc is intermediate, after the PhD and before the professor position. Gary’s opinion is that a postdoc should be considered as a period when you should be thinking about your own research goals and how to take those foward. Postdocs should be learning under the mentorship or apprenticeship of an investigator. Postdocs should be learning how to manage a group, mentor people, manage budgets, write grants, and lead a team.

However, Gary says that the postdoc is more likely a period of further research. Many people change field and get experience in another research group. Postdocs are often trying to get a certain number of published papers. Postdocs are trying to demonstrate they can succeed in a different lab and accrue credentials to get a faculty position to start as a professor.

Emily adds that there are eleven different common titles under which postdocs can be hired. There is a discrepancy between how employers see postdocs and how postdocs see themselves. What level of awareness do universities have around their own postdocs?

11:55 How was the idea for a project to assess postdoc salaries formed? What question were you asking?

When the team at Future of Research was looking at policies that were being updated in response to labor law, they realized that these policies at an institution don’t tell us necessarily what people are getting paid. Though the institution has a policy about postdoc salaries, actually paying postdocs that amount requires adherence to policy and someone following up to enforce policy. The team saw a pre-print paper by Rescuing Biomedical Research, another nonprofit, which looked at National Science Foundation data on number of postdocs and concluded that the number of postdocs in decline. They questioned whether there is truly a decline, or instead a bubble of people staying in postdoc positions for longer. These questions led them to start the project to collect data on postdoc salaries.

The team at Future of Research found that institutions are doing a terrible job of reporting year to year how many postdocs they had. While institutions were receptive to policy changes, if the institutions don’t know who the postdocs are to begin with, will people fall through the cracks? Will the policies actually be reflected in reality? The institution could recommend salary, but never follow up.

Institutions are also in a constant argument over whether postdocs are employees or trainees. Unfortunately, it seems postdocs are employees when it suits, such as when the institution needs to keep postdocs out of things they need to do for students, but postdocs are trainees in terms of lower salaries and receiving no benefits.

14:18 What position counts as an employee or not an employee?

Gary explains that whether a position is designated as an “employee” is complicated by where the money comes from. Postdocs may be “staff” on a grant, or postdocs may be on fellowships of various kinds. When postdocs are on fellowships or paid directly, they are usually referred to as trainees, typically lose benefits, and the institution says they are no longer an employee. The U.S. Department of Labor created a specification about who is an employee, specifying that it’s not who pays you, it’s the nature of the work. The Department of Labor made this specification because some institutions tried to designate postdocs as fellows to get out of the new labor law. The Department of Labor explicitly sent this message to the National Institutes of Health, stipulating that the NIH had to raise fellowship stipend under the new law.

17:08 What did you do for the postdoc salaries project?

The team from Future of Research wanted to analyze postdoc salaries, but they learned that this information was not easy to find. They carried out Freedom of Information requests at public institutions. They contacted the Freedom of Information or Public Records offices at public institutions, which were legally required to give out data like this. They asked for the position title and salary of everyone who was a postdoc, on date of December 1, 2016 when the new labor law was due to come into effect and changes were likely to happen. This method forces the institution to provide information, and this method served as an internal metric of whether universities know what postdocs are. Certain institutions didn’t know what a postdoc was, and asked Future of Research to explain what a postdoc is. Future of Research cross checked the information they received from Freedom of Information requests with the National Science Foundation data on postdoc numbers.

20:05 What was your analysis of the data from public institutions?

Future of Research had a data scientist on the team, who analyzed the distribution of salaries. They brought out patterns by geographic region, by gender, and by title. They examined what variables were affecting the salaries. Their aim was to assess the landscape and figure out what salary distribution looked like. This could set the bar to work from for efforts going forward.

21:07 What were the broad conclusions of the postdoc salaries project? Was there anything surprising to you?

Gary says they got broad distributions of postdoc salaries. Nature published a write-up that emphasized that postdoc salaries vary wildly by institution. Most people received between $40,000 and $49,999 annual pay. They found that 22% of all their data was within a $25 range around the new National Institute of Health minimum stipend, which was very close to the proposed salary threshold is under the federal labor law. Gary shares that when Future of Research considers the levers they need to pull to raise postdoc salaries, it is a very useful finding that the median salary of all postdocs across the US, regardless of field, was pegged to minimum NIH National Research Service Award stipend amount. The most effective policy lever for raising postdoc salaries in the U.S. is to get NIH to raise the NRSA award stipends.

Emily emphasizes that so many universities go off the NIH minimum salaries, even though it’s just a recommendation, and it’s just a minimum. She points out that this minimum doesn’t take into account different cost of living. Is this the minimum for Bethesda, Maryland, where the NIH is located? Institutions go off this as if it is absolute truth. Gary brings up that in December 2018, NIH raised minimum salary. Now the minimum is $50,000, this amount has been recommended for quite some time. Gary and Jessica Polka, president of Future of Research, are on the National Academies study for the Next Generation Researchers Initiative. They will be releasing recommendations informed by this data.

Gary was surprised by how many salaries were in the $50,000 range. They broke down the distribution by field for a large subset and found no real field dependence for the salaries. People would expect the humanities to be lower, but the humanities were not lower. Gary was surprised by how often biomedical engineering salaries were in the lower end of the distribution. Gary wonders who negotiates, and if there’s a disparity in who’s negotiating. He mentions that talking about money in academia is stigmatized.

Emily created the website PhD stipends with her husband. Now it has over 4000 entries in it. It is a great place to go for prospective graduate students. She has thought there should be the same resource for postdocs. They have started postdocsalaries.com for people to self-report their salaries. Future of Research obtained information from public institutions, but they are completely missing private institutions. Self reporting also provides a check on whether what the institution reports matches what postdocs report. Postdocsalaries.com is a useful self reporting tool, that helps other people compare salaries and gives them the opportunity to comment on issues.

Gary discusses that when he gives a talk at institution, he loves to bring up money. He wants to break the stigma that ‘we’re not supposed to talk about this’ and tell people that this should be one of the questions that you ask your prospective PI. Gary says how that question is answered will tell you a lot about the PI as a person. You should look for someone who responds “I would love to pay you more, we can look into fellowships or I can find opportunities to pay you extra,” and steer clear of potential advisors who say “This isn’t about the money.” This is part of gathering information for your decision.

37:08 What are some action steps that postdocs can take today to improve their salaries, benefits, or working conditions?

Gary says always having data at hand is useful for individuals and groups to advocate. With data, you can approach an institution with the salaries that people are getting in your field, and point out that this is what the policy says so this is the expectation. This is action you can take on the personal level.

When Future of Research compared institutions publicly, there were administrators who could now use the data to say that the institution is being compared to everyone else, if they want to be competitive for postdocs they need to raise postdoc salaries. For groups looking to push for change in an institution, there are a number of lines of evidence. Gary says that comparing with peer institutions is useful. The most recent recommendations are that postdoc salaries should be at least $50,000 then adjusted for cost of living, then for your years of experience.

Listeners should go to postdocsalaries.com to get involved and learn more.

40:56 Conclusion

Negotiating PhD Funding Offers: This Grad Student Did It Successfully

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In this episode, Emily interviews John Vsetecka, a second-year PhD student in History at Michigan State University. When John was a prospective PhD student, he attempted to negotiate the stipend and benefits of the three admissions offers he was seriously considering. John shares exactly how he initiated the negotiation process and the outcomes at each of the universities. His negotiation method is well-researched and well-considered and is applicable to many if not most other prospective graduate students. John and Emily also discuss how prospective PhD students should combat imposter syndrome during the admissions process.

Links mentioned in episode

negotiating PhD offer

0:00 Introduction

1:05 Please Introduce Yourself

John Vsetecka is a second-year PhD student in the Department of History at Michigan State University. He studies modern Ukrainian history, with a focus on the 1932-1933 famine. Before beginning his PhD program, he worked as a GEAR UP advisor. This is a federal grant agency that works with low income students, called Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs. He worked in Colorado to help middle school and high school, low income students prepare for college. Before this job, he got a Master of Arts in History in 2014 at the University of Northern Colorado.

2:55 What PhD offers and interview requests did you receive from universities?

When John applied to PhD programs, he applied to eight schools and faced some rejections. He considered four offers, then narrowed his list to three. The first offer he eliminated would have required that he start with MA and work into PhD. Since he already had an MA, he felt he was ready to move on. He seriously considered three offers. He accepted the offer from Michigan State University, where he is now. He visited “University 2” in person for an interview. He had a virtual interview with “University 3.”

4:21 What did you think about the offers from these three universities?

John wasn’t sure what a fair offer was for a PhD position in History. Generally, PhD students are shy about sharing their financial experiences. So he did research and his mentor from the University of Northern Colorado guided him in this process. He talked to other PhD students, who would say they had enough to live on or that they were struggling. He used the websites GradCafe and PhD Stipends. He got a sense of what people were being paid, including their health insurance and fees. From all of this information, he decided two offers were fair and worth considering.

Emily shares an important piece of advice for prospective PhD students is to do your research. Anonymous databases, like PhD Stipends, provide more transparency around these offers. But you should talk to current graduate students, because it’s one thing to look at the numbers, and another thing to get a feel for how it is to live on that amount.

Further Reading: How to Read Your PhD Program Offer Letter

7:54 How did you initiate the negotiation process for your PhD stipend offers?

John negotiated his stipend offers during his interviews. He went to visit two universities in person for interviews, and had a virtual interview a University 3. His first interview was at University 2. During the visit, they have an itinerary and fully scheduled day. The experience is like a whirlwind. He prepared a set of questions for faculty members and set of questions for Graduate Director. With the Graduate Director, he talked about the PhD program as a whole to get their insight. Then he directly asked the Graduate Director if there is any other money available, such as other fellowships, and explained that he has other offers with higher financial value. The Graduate Director is the one that can control the money. The faculty can only put in good word on a student’s behalf. So as a prospective PhD student, you should know who you can talk to and know who you can negotiate with. You don’t need to be afraid to ask tough questions about financial aid.

The PhD program interview was a good time to negotiate PhD stipend offers. John waited until he received all offers to see where he stood across the field, and this gave him some leverage. Negotiating like this is is what people do with any other job. John told the Graduate Director that he had other offers, but he didn’t show them the letters themselves. Negotiating before receiving all other offers and before the interview can seem desperate. But if he negotiated after the visit, it might seem like that offer wasn’t his first choice and he was only negotiating after losing another offer. John also believes that talking in person is the best type of communication. Negotiating in person puts them on the spot.

During his interview visit for University 2, John asked the Graduate Director about the potential for a better financial package. The Graduate Director told John that they would get back to him a couple hours. Later that day, John received an email with a offer for a fellowship package. This showed John that they were willing to work on his behalf. He was surprised by this because he had expected them to negotiate and push back. During the interview visit, the department is most focused on recruitment, so they quickly considered his request and acted on it.

John went into the meeting with a set plan for negotiation. He had a notebook and visibly took notes during the conversation, which indicates that he took the negotiation seriously. Treating graduate school interviews like a professional scenario sets you up for success.

14:35 What new offer did you receive after negotiating?

Because he negotiated with the Graduate Director, John received an offer of a university fellowship instead of a teaching assistantship. The new offer was university-based funding, not department-based funding like his original offer. The university fellowship had different teaching requirements than the department teaching assistantship. It was more money in total, as well as better health care coverage. This showed what kind of control the department and university has over financial awards for PhD students. Even if the university can’t raise stipends, they can cover more fees or provide better benefits.

16:22 What outcomes did you get from negotiating with the other two universities?

John learned that not everyone would negotiate. At Michigan State, he had a generous offer that he was already happy with. Even so, he asked the Director of Graduate Studies at Michigan State about his financial award. The director kindly told him that his original financial award was what the department was willing to offer. John later learned that his department offers different financial packages based on a tiered system, and he was happy with the offer he received.

At University 3, John had a virtual meeting with the department. John brought up that he had offers with much more value than what they had offered him. John says that honestly, he was displeased with University 3’s financial offer. He learned that due to financial constraints at University 3, the department couldn’t offer more money. The department suggested term-to-term options. John didn’t want to be on his toes every semester wondering if he’d get paid. Though University 3 offered paid tuition, the money offered for teaching/research was not enough to even consider.

It’s important for prospective PhD students to recognize that some offers only tell you about the first year, while others present a five-year plan for funding.

19:35 Based on what you experienced, what would you do to negotiate differently?

John says he wouldn’t change much. While he knew negotiation was possible, he personally didn’t know anyone in his cohort group that negotiated their stipend offer. John heard from his advisors and mentors that it’s ok to ask, but you have to know to ask. John says this is one of those hidden things in academia. If prospective graduate students receive multiple offers, this is a chance to use offers against each other.
even if you get one offer, be happy, but if you get more offers you can use them

Emily brings up that often, applicants don’t feel a lot of confidence. They often think, “Who am I to be receiving these offers?” This imposter syndrome deters prospective PhD students from negotiating their stipends and ensuring that they receive the best offer.

22:27 How did you know negotiating your PhD offer would be possible and welcome?

John’s MA program advisor told him how to negotiate PhD stipend offers. First, you have to apply to multiple universities and know their programs well. Second, you need to know who you want to work with. Third, you need to talk with current graduate students. This is the most important advice. If you find their email on department websites, you can email them directly. Fourth, online communities like GradCafe help you connect with people who can help you.

John says that graduate school applicants should treat a PhD position like any other job. John says this profession should not be excluded from the process of negotiation. John’s experience at GEAR UP, where he helped low income students fight for undergraduate school money, showed him that there is a lot of money out there. He says it’s unfortunate so many undergraduates go into a lot of debt, when there are all types of money out there for different skills and talents. John wonders why graduate students can’t have that money too? There are different organizations, based in different fields, but money is out there. He suggests prospective students apply to everything they’re qualified for, but they also ask universities and departments what they can give.

Emily adds that prospective PhD students need to consider cost of living. If you have school A versus school B with higher stipend and in lower cost of living, you can ask the school A’s department what they can do to make the offer comparable.

26:44 Has your negotiation had any lasting impact on your graduate career?

John says the negotiation process doesn’t stop when you receive your final offer. Negotiation is a longer standing issue to think about in the future. At Michigan State, John and his peers negotiate for conference money, travel money, research money for the summer. Some graduate students can’t find money beyond teaching assistantships. Because he considered these benefits in his financial offer, he accepted a position that allows him the time and money to not worry. He has summer funding and he can teach online. For instance, he taught a seven week class online while being in Ukraine for research. He chose a school with an institutional investment. The department is doing well and it is investing in its students. He saw that the department was willing to invest continually in their students. He thinks the investment will continue after he graduates.

29:33 Final Comments

John says prospective graduate students should feel free to reach out to him. He likes to help in any way he can. When you get your offers, the first thing you should do is celebrate, and get a round of applause. After celebrating, look over your financial offer, and look beyond stipend to health insurance and benefits. If you get multiple offers, compare them. Be confident about your acceptance into a program and don’t be afraid to negotiate. Know that you have power in these situations. Even though graduate students often don’t have much power, this is the situation where you do. You have all the power and you should use it while you can.John treated PhD offers like job offers because it’s also a job, in literal and figurative sense.

31:27 Conclusion

As a Single Parent, This Graduate Student Utilizes Every Possible Resource

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In this podcast episode, Emily interview Lauri Lutes, a fourth-year PhD student at Oregon State University and single mother. Lauri’s stipend is equivalent to the local living wage for just one adult, yet she supports herself and her daughter on it without using student loans. Lauri details how she makes ends meet by taking advantage of every possible university and community benefit, such as subsidized and free childcare, food assistance, and recreation and arts scholarships. Lauri additionally serves her community by advocating for graduate student parents on two university boards.

Links mentioned in episode

resourceful grad student

0:00 Introduction

1:02 Please Introduce Yourself

Lauri Lutes is a PhD student at Oregon State University. She studies viruses on sweet cherry trees. She has an 8 year old daughter and she’s a single mom.

2:19 What is your current annual income and expenses?

Lauri’s graduate stipend is $24,000 per year. Her assistantship is assured for her entire PhD, for either teaching or research. Her modest estimate of her current annual expenses is $27,000 to $30,000. These expenses cover a bare minimum, like paying rent, and don’t include expenses like a car payment. Her estimates don’t take into account her supplemental income from food assistance programs.

According to MIT’s Living Wage Calculator (livingwage.mit.edu), the living wage for one adult with one child in Benton County, Oregon is $51,000 before tax/$42,000 after tax. In order to live with her daughter on her Oregon State University PhD stipend, Lauri has to take advantage of every possible resource.

4:24 What benefits do you receive and how did you find these benefits?

When Lauri was considering graduate school, her daughter was four years old. Lauri was most interested in Pacific Northwest universities, and she was surprised to learn that Oregon State University offers resources to help graduate students who are parents be successful.

Lauri receives two main benefits from the university. First, she receives a childcare subsidy that is provided through student fees and donor funding. Through the childcare subsidy, up to 50% of childcare expenses are covered. This subsidy is applicable for childcare for very young children before they’re in school, as well as for before and after school programs for children in public school. Lauri says it’s rare for a university to offer this assistance, and for the subsidy to cover up to 50%.

Second, Lauri receives assistance for non-school childcare. Oregon State University has two childcare facilities that are drop-in for up to three hours per day. This service is free. The childcare facilities are located in the library and in the recreation center. They are open from 10am to 7pm on the weekends and during the weekdays as well. They accept children on a first-come, first-serve basis, but Lauri has not had problems with accessing childcare from these facilities. Student workers from child development, education relevant fields are the childcare providers. Lauri says the facilities are a well-managed, reliable resource for student parents.

9:31 What is your daily routine like? Is your advisor supportive?

During Lauri’s first couple of years in her PhD program, she served in orchards throughout the entire State. Lauri had to take day trips and overnight trips for her work. She relied on friends and her community for help. Lately, she is in the lab for most of the day. She tries to keep a 9 to 5 work schedule. Her work doesn’t require her to be in the lab on the weekends. When she does travel, the bulk of her work is in the Columbia River Gorge, which is three hour drive from her university.

Laurie says she has an incredibly supportive advisor. She says she is fortunate that her advisor doesn’t make her compromise her parenting for her work. During her graduate school interviews, Lauri didn’t emphasize that she had a daughter, but she didn’t make it a secret. She encourages other people to consider how their potential advisors would support them.

13:06 Tell us about your service experience on advisory boards and committees.

Lauri was invited to join the advisory board of the university’s Family Resource Center. She viewed this as a place to get her voice heard, and to give a voice to graduate student parents. The advisory board decides on the budget for student fees, where that funding goes under the umbrella of the Family Resource Center. This budget includes the childcare assistance stipend, which is available for students with families on campus and employees with dependents.

Additionally, Lauri is the graduate student representative on the committee for children, youth and families in the university’s faculty senate. This committee reports directly to president of the university. To Lauri, this seems like they can make changes on the university level. This committee considers the university experience of students and faculty with dependents, not limited to only young children. Lauri says they want to cultivate a culture of care at the university, that includes being able to support students and faculty in whatever is going on in their lives. When employers are sensitive to family and personal issues, people are kept in the workforce.

17:34 What strategies do you use to keep expenses down?

Lauri emphasizes how important it was to let go of the stigma of needing help and asking for help. Before graduate school, Lauri had a stable position in industry and an income to support herself and her daughter. Graduate school brought a drastic change in income which was difficult to accept and deal with. To achieve her goal of getting a PhD, she had to use university and community resources.

Lauri uses the food bank on campus, and has let go of the stigma of actually going to food bank. Food insecurity is not only experienced by people with families. It is an all too common issue being discussed at many universities. Over half of Lauri’s income goes to rent, and there is no way for her to make that better. Lauri says one way to supplement her income is in food assistance. She says she has to accept that this is where she’s at right now. Oregon State University manages a twitter account @eatfreeOSU that provides centralized posts of where there is leftover free food from events. Some people rely on free food from seminars.

Lauri gets some funding through the SNAP food assistance program. She applied online, which she says was a fairly easy process, and had a phone interview. She had to prove her income initially and again every six months or whenever her income changes. SNAP benefits are for her daughter, not for use by her. The State of Oregon provides information for SNAP online. Oregon State University’s Human Services Resource Center is very helpful for students. Not every university has a centralized center for finding food assistance.

Lauri is enrolled in Mealbux, a university program funded by student fees. She applies every term. The application is a questionnaire about a student’s income and food insecurity situation. The funds are loaded onto the student id card for use on campus. This assistance is specifically for Lauri. Mealbux helps with a student’s sense of belonging on campus.

Lauri recently moved her daughter to school closer to home. At this new school, her daughter participates in free lunch program. Lauri has a car that is very old so she doesn’t have car payment. She rarely uses her car and expects it to break down anytime. She uses her bicycle to get around. She knows food expenses are hard to minimize.

Lauri finds community resources in many places. Local parks and recreation department has scholarships available, such as one that allowed them membership to community pool. Her daughter gets scholarships to take classes, like dance class or painting class. These are things Lauri wouldn’t be able to afford otherwise. Another resource is the Arts for All programs that provide inexpensive tickets to theater events. Lauri says don’t be afraid to apply for help and scholarships. She wants to give her daughter opportunities that she can’t afford on her own. She’s always looking for resources and she’s not afraid to take advantage of available programs.

30:30 Why have you chosen to this frugal strategy instead of taking out student loans?

Lauri has debt from her undergraduate education. These loans are deferred, but they are looming over her. She does not want to contribute more than she absolutely has to. She did take out a few loans to help transition into the PhD program. She has $30,000 loans for undergrad, and she’d rather make sacrifices now than contribute more to debt.

Lauri used to make living wage and be comfortable. Her goal isn’t to increase her wages with her PhD. Her field, plant pathology, is not known for high wages. She wants to be open to a postdoc position after graduate school. She expects to make similar wages as she did in the industry job she had with a Bachelors degree. She went to graduate school for education, fulfillment, and opportunity. When she finishes her PhD, she won’t make a lot of money that she can use to pay off debt. Emily adds that it’s challenging to pay off debt at any time.

33:55 Final Comments

Lauri advises graduate student parents to take advantage of resources. Search for them, ask about them, and talk to others about possible benefits. By diving into resources, you’ll become aware of more. She believes that getting a PhD is worth the financial sacrifice. Though it is a financial challenge, don’t give up on your dreams.

34:55 Conclusion