40k is 40k – Statement regarding Base Funding Increase
Since the summer of 2024 the UTGSU Base Funding Committee (BFC) has shared a petition with over 2500 graduate student signatures stating:
“We, the undersigned University of Toronto graduate students, respectfully demand that the University increase the base funding to all graduate students in the funded cohorts to a minimum of $40,000 per year, with no less than $30,000 of that sum achieved without additional labour which does not contribute towards graduation, while providing annual increases as necessary to keep pace with inflation moving forward.”
Only the first of these three demands have begun to be addressed, and only to a subset of the funded cohort. We reaffirm our belief that this funding increase should apply to all students who receive stipends, such as research-stream master’s students.
What we are seeing now are the consequences of a lack of guidelines regarding the implementation of this increase in the addition of non-thesis labour into funding packages. Without a commitment from central administration to annual increases in funding, graduate students remain vulnerable to financial insecurity due to the rising cost of living. Read the full statement below:
Letter on Base Funding Increases
The Graduate Student community at UofT welcomed the November 2024 announcement of an increase in base funding to all funded PhD and SJD programs. Though master’s students and other unfunded graduate students who face the same pressures from the rising cost of living were left out, this marked the first meaningful change in graduate program funding in a decade.
However, it has become clear that there is no plan to implement this funding increase. The burden of this funding increase is being deflected to the departments, who in turn are clawing back as much of the 40k as possible from supervisor’s grant funds, merit-based awards, and teaching assistant work.
Many departments are scrambling to make up the difference through mechanisms that risk substantial negative consequences for research and teaching at the university. Some of these proposed measures include:
- Large increases to graduate student research and/or teaching workloads in addition to the work already needed for the student’s progress through their PhD;
- The reduction or cancellation of funds used to support conference travel, research expenses, top ups for students holding competitive awards, students beyond the funded cohort, and students in financial need;
- Shortening program timelines and withholding previously guaranteed funding for students in years 5 and up without making any changes to doctoral program requirements;
- Downloading funding responsibilities to supervisors without attention to how this will impact student-supervisor relationships.
The 40k base funding is critical to ensuring graduate students can live, work, and learn in Toronto, but there is no feasible path to this goal without the central administration providing the necessary funds and guardrails. In particular, this increase cannot come at the cost of clawbacks of other funding sources at the university, faculty, or department level. Our call is simple: the University’s central administration introduced the changes–they should pay for it.
Signatories:
- University of Toronto Graduate Students’ Union (UTGSU)
- UTGSU Base Funding Committee
- UTGSU International Students’ Caucus
- Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 3902 (CUPE 3902)
- CUPE 3902 Engineering Caucus