Tuesday’s Graduate Student Government (GSG) meeting was a “talkative bunch” in the words of Will Cantrell, Dean of the Graduate School. Free pizza was on the table, but students were more focused on rising costs, shuttle schedules, and changes to funding avenues. Along with the standard reports from the GSG e-board came Amy Landis, the new Associate Dean of Graduate and Online Education, as well as a representative for the Committee for Accessible and Affordable Learning Materials (CAALM). Both parties provided introductions and a brief report on their responsibilities.
Among the most spirited discussions of the evening was the back-and-forth with Will Cantrell, Dean of the Graduate School. Cantrell stressed the importance of students graduating as soon as possible, “It should take as long as it needs to, and no longer,” adding, “time is money that Michigan Tech has to spend to support PhD students.” Beyond the expense for the school, Cantrell also noted that the graduate student stipend is often far less than what students could be making in the industry as further motive for finishing the program. Currently, it takes graduate students an average of 5.2 years to complete their degree, a figure the Dean is paying close attention to this academic year.
Treasurer Jessica Czarnecki gave remarks about the GSG budgeting outlook for the 2025-2026 academic year. With a budgeted $127,551 and expected revenue of $89,206, GSG is facing a worrisome $38,345 deficit, which in the words of Czarnecki is “not great.” This impacts graduate students in many ways, most tangibly in a reworked travel-budget allowance. Where students may have taken travel funding for granted in the past, Czarnecki makes it clear that the allowance is on a strictly as-needed basis for traveling Huskies. The Treasury presented no plan to mitigate the deficit at Tuesday’s meeting.
As for the general body, several miscellaneous issues were raised over the course of the meeting. One body member mentioned that the Career Fair was sorely lacking employment opportunities for graduates, especially for international students. Additionally, multiple body members voiced complaints directed at the rising prices in the MUB’s Campus Market menu. Secretary Shammas Mahmood Shafi responded that GSG has little authority to address such concerns and will be unlikely to succeed in negotiating prices back down. Recent successes from GSG include their Husky Shuttle transportation services collaboration with TripShot. President Lauren Sprague announced in her report that the service has “been running well for a while now,” and that the government is pleased with the triumph and intends to keep the program alive into the future.
GSG meets every other Tuesday in ChemSci 102. For more information, visit their website at gsg.mtu.edu.
