The urgent need to recognize and value academic labor

Two Harvard professors share their thoughts on the latest from the US Republican Party’s tuition waiver tax plan.

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Recently the House of Representatives essentially voted to destroy graduate education in the United States. By taxing tuition waivers as income — and therefore treating their taxable income as two to three times the amount graduate students are actually paid — the Republican tax bill would effectively put graduate study outside of the reach of all but the independently wealthy. While the Senate version of the tax bill does not include this provision, it is far from certain what the final bill after the reconciliation process will look like.

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Changes to the U.S. tax code will harm graduate student mobility and career prospects

Increased financial burden for students will harm science in the long run, says Aliyah Weinstein.

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A recent editorial in Nature described the harm that newly proposed changes to the United States tax code will have on graduate student finances. If passed, these regulations — ostensibly designed to simplify tax calculations — will eliminate benefits previously given to students. Of particular harm to graduate students and the scientific world would be the elimination of the tax-free status of tuition waivers.

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Boston Career Expo Journalist competition winner: Saheli Sadanand

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{credit}Lesley Pasman {/credit}

Saheli Sadanand recently defended her Ph.D. in the Department of Immunobiology at Yale University. She has written extensively for both scientific and non-scientific audiences on everything from the necessity of vaccines to the value of science education. In her spare time, she enjoys spending time with her family and friends, travelling, reading history books (both factual and fictional), eating chocolate chip cookies and trying to convince everyone around her that dinosaurs were the greatest animals of all time. She recommends following the escapee penguin’s lead and checking out Buenos Aires if you get a chance. 

A penguin walks through that door right now wearing a sombrero. What does he say and why is he here?

I sat alone, with a cup of half-drunk tea, a chocolate chip cookie and a notepad next to me. I stared at the top of the notepad. I had written “The Future” in big capital letters and underlined the words a few times, hoping that this would help me figure out what I should do as I stared at the list of options below. The notepad was chockfull of information but instead of feeling decisive as I stared at “THE FUTURE,” I was just tired. The present wasn’t great, but the future seemed increasingly scary. What if everything went wrong again? Continue reading