As a first-year graduate student and teaching assistant at UW, I am incredibly concerned about the proposed increase in segregated fees that will be voted on during the April 12-14 ASM election. I am concerned not only because I will be a graduate student at UW for who-knows-how-long and therefore paying seg fees for who-knows-how-long, but mostly because UW has been steadily increasing students' segregated fees each year, making me fearful that by the time I get out of here, I will be spending over a quarter of my TA salary to pay for segregated fees (currently an average TA spends 9 percent of his or her annual salary on segregated fees).
I was aware of segregated fees as an undergrad at the Ohio State University, and I was even aware that part of my segregated fees went to pay for the building of OSU's recreation facility known as the RPAC. When I started graduate school here at UW, I was not surprised to learn that students of UW also pay segregated fees. However, what did surprise me was how high the seg fees are here at UW.
Currently, over 80 percent of our segregated fees are designated as non-allocable, which means the money goes to cover fixed, ongoing costs of student services––such as the rebuilding of Union South and the Memorial Union renovations. Now, NAT UP 2010 is proposing that each student pay an additional $100 per year to cover the cost of yet another ongoing building project, namely the rebuilding of the Natatorium. When such a huge percentage of our segregated fees is already being used for construction endeavors, do we really need to begin renovations of the Nat? Especially when so many classroom buildings on campus are also in need of renovation and the construction on Union South is still going on? I think it's ridiculous to ask poor college students to pay for the building of this new recreation facility, especially considering the current state of the economy and the rising costs of tuition and books as well.
Although I'm sure it would be nice to have a brand new swimming pool and rec center to show off to prospective students, why should the current students be burdened with the cost of building it? [Editor's note: The rise in segregated fees would not go into effect until the fall of 2013] Or why can't the university at least finish one building project before beginning another?
When I asked my fellow TAs what I personally could do to stop this increase in segregated fees, I received a simple answer: Vote NO on the issue during the ASM online election on April 12-14. So that's what I'm going to do. And I urge all UW students who want to stop the yearly increase in segregated fees to do the same. This is our chance to say NO––if we don't, then for the next 30 years, we're gonna pay––literally.
––Alyson Sewell
UW-Madison grad student
