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Suggested subject line: Provost Rosenbaum: Eliminate AR Tuition Now

Dear Provost Rosenbaum,

As a graduate student at the University of Chicago, I write to
you with my concern over the undue burden that Advanced
Residence out-of-pocket tuition places on the financial
resources and time-to-degree of graduate students. I sincerely
hope that your pending decision on the AR system will take my
concern and my proposed solution below into account.

As the report of the Committee on Advanced Residence and Time
to Degree recognizes, the current rate of AR out-of-pocket
tuition at $2,600 is too high. I appreciate your decision to
have frozen any increases for the past two years, but I appeal
to you to take the step of completely eliminating this burden
on AR students.

I stand with many graduate students in asking for the
elimination of AR tuition because it is clearly one of the
biggest hurdles to the timely completion of our degrees and it
continues to hurt us financially.  I disagree with the
assertion that this fee is an incentive for graduate students
to finish faster.  Many students try to obtain as much
teaching as possible in all three quarters of the academic
year, just to avoid the high cost of the out-pocket tuition.
And other students, who have little or no access to teaching
jobs, struggle to find the funds to pay this fee.

I write with the knowledge that you have gathered feedback
from different constituencies of the University over the past
few months. While graduate students have had opportunities to
voice their concerns and provide serious proposals for
reforming the current system, I write to you to re-iterate the
concerns of an overwhelming majority of graduate students, as
I have heard it expressed at various forums and through many
conversations.

I commend the Committee s recommendations for creating more
scholarships for graduate student research, for building a
public database for teaching opportunities, and for advocating
more supervision and advising for graduate students.
 However, the issue of AR out-pocket-tuition remains a
serious concern to me and my fellow graduate students at the
University of Chicago.  I hope that your decision will take
this concern and my proposed solution into account.

Sincerely,