Unpaid graduate internships

I do not appreciate the moderator's opinions being added to the end
of my posting.  If the moderator would like their opinion voiced
they should do as I have done and place a posting with their name at
the bottom.

I am not pleased about being called naive.  I believe that it is the
offending institutions which are naive. The $14-17,000 stipend that
the programs give to the students, although much larger that ever
before in the past, is wholly insufficient.  I am not asking the
institutions to pay graduate interns $30K, but rather make up the
short falling.

A clean, and safe one bedroom apartment in the metro DC area rents
for at least $850 and, more often, including utilities is closer to
$1000 a month, safe places in the district itself are closer to
$1500. Living in the more cost effective suburbs requires
transportation, an additional expense I will not even add in.  Throw
in $280 a month for personal health insurance and you have already
spent the programs stipend.  Now add in food, clothing, tuition,
student loans payments that become due 6 months into the internship
and the rest of life's little expenses and the student is easily
$5-7,000 or more in the red.  I do not feel that $5000 is an
unreasonable amount to ask institutions to contribute.

Larry Shutts
Post-Graduate Conservation Fellow
National Air and Space Museum


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                  Conservation DistList Instance 17:48
                Distributed: Tuesday, December 30, 2003
                       Message Id: cdl-17-48-004
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