April 26, 2006 UC Families Newsletter Circulation: 761 Moderator: Karie Frasch email: ucfam@lists.berkeley.edu Website: http://parents.berkeley.edu/ucfamilies Post a Message: http://parents.berkeley.edu/post_ucfam.html ---------------------------------------------- Contents ---------------------------------------------- *Responses Original post: Insurance for grad students' families Original post: UC Berkeley Childcare - Time Your Baby Right *New postings Repost: Graduate Student: Question about leave Repost: Babies and Fieldwork *News/media Only the Fertile Need Apply Family-friendly policies for faculty are now 'an entitlement:' Newly approved package of work-life benefits likely to give UC a competitive edge among academic employers *New members Since 4/17/06 ---------------------------------------------- *Responses ---------------------------------------------- You can post additional responses at: http://parents.berkeley.edu/post_ucfam.html Original post: Insurance for grad students' families ------------------------------------------- Recently in recruiting a potential grad. student, I discovered that Berkeley is at a disadvantage when it comes to providing health insurance for spouses, domestic partners and children of graduate students. Apparently, we provide only a link to private insurance plans. Yale (from which this student also had a good offer) provides an optional health insurance package for families of graduate students. The students pay extra, but at below market rate. Shouldn't a family friendly university system include this in its package of benefits? How expensive is additional coverage and how do grad. students across the campus pay for it? Response: Health Insurance for Grad Student Families ------------------------------------------- First, as a graduate student with a family I am deeply insulted by the idea that UHS has ''successfully met families' needs by referring to the individual plans''. Telling me where I can buy insurance for $75-$200/mo is not meeting any need not already taken care of by the YellowPages. Providing affordable healthcare/daycare should not be viewed as ''subsidizing'' students. Most ''students'' who would take advantage of these programs would be graduate level and even with the ''subsidy'' the university gets one hell of deal. Graduate students are not paid equivalent salaries for doing the same work as technicians, adjuncts, etc., despite equivalent or superior experience and education. So, you could think of the difference as ''profit'' for the university. And taking some of that ''profit'' and using it to support daycare/healthcare only frees people to work MORE for the university. Increasing ''profit''. At worst, it's a wash. At best, the university gains by having happier, healthier, more productive graduate students doing what they do best: keeping the university system afloat. The current setup leads to financial and mental stress, time away from research or teaching because there is no affordable daycare, and bitter resentment at a bloated university system that is apparently indifferent. PS - Writing this post inspired me to go look at the UCB budget. My degree is biology, but I think the university has an extra $100,000,000 a year in revenue (total recipts - total expenditures). As a little exercise, let's say that 50% of ~10,000 graduate/professional students enrolled at Berkeley for 2004-2005 had dependents. The going rate for comprehensive dependent health insurance is ~$125/mo. If the university outright supplied this coverage at market rates it would spend $1500/year * 5000 = $7,500,000. If they only subsidized it, the cost would be much less. 100,000,000 - 7,500,000 = still a lot of money!! Daycare is pricier, but I know for a fact that the university student daycare is heavily, heavily subsidized by the State of California and NOT UCB. Anonymous Original post: UC Berkeley Childcare - Time Your Baby Right ------------------------------------------- This is a message for all grad student prospective parents trying to figure out when is the best time to have a baby with the least disruption to your studies. If you want to use the UC Berkeley Childcare program, make sure you DON'T have your baby in Fall. The Berkeley program only admits infants of certain ages (older than 3 months at start of Fall semester, older than 7 months at start of Spring), which means that if you have a baby in the Fall, you will not qualify until the following Fall. What is more, as we are currently learning, you probably won't get in the following Fall because those already in the program have priority, and the program is heavily over subscribed. My partner and I are both international grad students who earn step 1 or 2 GSR rates and we are being told there is a good chance our daughter won't get in this coming Fall. Who is the UC Childcare supposed to be for if not families like ours? Response: to the posting on UC childcare ------------------------------------------- I agree with you that the the UC childcare age policies are restrictive. It also seems that the childcare prioritizes undergraduates over graduate students, as it is usually apparent during the summer, when the reduced number of slots available are reserved for families of undergraduates. This is, I believe, connected to the kind of state funding undergrad parents receive, not to the fact that they like them better... and in any case, this does not hold true this summer, because the lack of funding in general has made sure that the UC childcare will shut its doors in five weeks, for three months, for every student parent around. This said, it is also true that there is a quite high turnover of children (parents graduating, moving, etc.), so it is likely that your child will be admitted in the Fall anyway. And, as another parent wrote some time ago, it might be useful to make sure that the managers SEE you, that is to be vocal about the fact that you really need your child to get in. Also, a new child-care center for faculty, staff and students is being built right now, two blocks west of Telegraph. It is scheduled to open next January (so it will likely open in the following Fall), the money to run it is not available yet (...) but we can always, of course, cross our fingers and hope that this will increase the number of slots available. Keep in mind, also, that UC childcare is closed for every single holiday you can think of: two/three weeks at Christmas, two weekdays at spring break, two weekdays at Thanksgiving, not to mention of course the summer, whose management is so well-done that, even in the years in which it DOES remain open, you have to wait until the end of May to know if you child gets in, which means that at that point, if your child is not among the lucky few, you have a week to find a different childcare arrangement. Some people choose to send their children to ''outside'' child-care programs. Some Berkeley and Albany child-care programs are, in fact, subsidized as well (Early Start, St John's, New School) and, as far as I know, stay open all year- long, so you should consider those ones too. I hope this helps, good luck and congratulations! Silvia ---------------------------------------------- *New postings ---------------------------------------------- You can post a response message: http://parents.berkeley.edu/post_ucfam.html Repost: Graduate Student: Question about leave ------------------------------------------- Hi All, I am a pregnant graduate student taking my 2nd quals on April 17th. I am due to give birth at the beginning of September, so will be unable to teach Fall quarter. I looked into taking a maternity leave and it actually seems like a pretty bad deal (I will have to pay for health insurance and be unable to take out loans; my partner is a part-time adjunct, so there will not be a flow of money coming in). I was wondering if anyone has had success with a leave or has found an alternative that does not involve paying full fees. Thanks in advance for any tips. Additionally, anyone else out there just starting a family? Jessica Repost: Babies and Fieldwork ------------------------------------------- Hello - I have a 7 month old son, and plan on taking my QE's next spring, when he'll be about a year and a half old. Students in my department without children usually take a year abroad after their QE's to do research. I'm wondering if any of you have experience with taking very young kids abroad. I would be going to do library and museum research in a clean, modern city, so I'm not worried about taking my son there for any health or safety reasons. Mostly I'm worried about what my spouse will do. Should I expect him to come with us (he could take a year of leave from work, or even retire early)? Or will he be miserable in a foreign country where he isn't working and I've got my own thing going? Or, should I just take my son and expect my husband to come visit? I guess a third option would be for me to just go alone. I'm wondering how other people have handled this and what the pros and cons have been. Thanks! Elisabeth ------------------------------------------ *Articles and media ------------------------------------------ You can post comments or discussion points about any of these, or offer new ones - http://parents.berkeley.edu/post_ucfam.html "Only the Fertile Need Apply," By Charlotte Fishman Inside Higher Education, April 20, 2006 http://insidehighered.com/views/2006/04/20/fishman (Opinion piece about Stanford's recent plan to provide graduate student birth mothers with maternity leave, but not allowing adoptive parents to use the benefit). "Family-friendly policies for faculty are now 'an entitlement:' Newly approved package of work-life benefits likely to give UC a competitive edge among academic employers," By Cathy Cockrell The Berkeleyan, April 13, 2006 http://www.berkeley.edu/news/berkeleyan/2006/04/13_family.shtml