Graduate students are an integral part of the educational institution at every level. 

At first, it may appear that the responsibilities of a graduate student focus entirely on their own education, however, this could not be farther from the truth. Graduate students often do work to support their department. They take positions as teaching assistants, interns, researchers, or even teach entire class sections for their area of study. 

Whether they are behind the scenes or directly involved with the teaching and instructing the next generation of students, graduate student workers make up an astounding 9,043 individual members of the 35,952 strong student body at the University of Kentucky alone.

As both members and educators, graduate students are essential to the future of academia. Despite their importance, graduate student employment opportunities at the University of Kentucky pay as little as $14,000 a year. 

As per university guidelines, to be considered a full-time student you must take 12 credit hours a semester. According to the Michigan Technological University graduates are expected to work 3.5 hours for every credit hour of coursework, making a student who takes 9-12 credit hours work an average of 36.75 hours a week on school alone.

Working 36 hours (which, mind you, is just 4 hours shy of full time) puts prospective graduate students on a tight schedule before even beginning to consider their employment as student workers. This leaves almost no time to work and learn simultaneously.  

Despite that undeniably grueling schedule, graduate students still somehow find the time to bring enrichment to academics through employment at universities. If they can make the schedule work, they can use the employment opportunities to further their academic goals as aspiring professors, scientists, engineers and productive members of society.

It all comes at a cost however, they gain relevant experience at the cost of impoverishment. 

While it is no secret that graduate programs aren’t free, the opportunities afforded to them here in Lexington make as little as $14,000 a year. 

$14,000 a year before taxes is not even close to what would be considered a living wage, which is defined as the minimum wage required to live free of public or private assistance. According to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Living Wage Calculator, living here in Fayette County as a single adult with no children requires one to earn a minimum annual wage of $40,942.

It’s perfectly clear that there is a disparity in the rate that the future of society is compensated. These individuals, already in mounds of debt, amidst striving to become some of our most esteemed and successful citizens, are not paid enough to live free of public or private assistance. 

I find it truly abhorrent that not only is our future as a society so disparaged, but that this is common practice across the country. Collegiate institutions benefit from the labor of those motivated to increase our prosperity, predatorily exploiting them as a resource, instead of facilitating their own flourishing. 

A measly $14,000 salary isn’t enough to pay for housing and food for a year. How do we expect graduates, who already hold positions as full-time students, to survive, let alone thrive? 

These individuals have taken the time to invest in themselves and their future (our collective societal future) and the University of Kentucky refuses to return the favor. 

It has been no great secret that secondary education has started to become increasingly more expensive. So expensive that campaigns have started forming to label college as a scam across all sides of the political aisle. 

Educated and impoverished must never be allowed to become synonymous, or we risk stagnation and regression as a society. 

We, as rational agents in society, cannot stand by and allow individuals to invest in the benefit of all, only to be cheated out of their returns. Faith in the integrity of these institutions must be examined, or they will continue their abuse of the optimistic and auspiciously intentioned in order to increase shareholder value.