Emerson is too expensive: Spring 2020 Disorientation Guide

Emerson is too expensive.

And other truths we all know,

but shouldn’t accept.

Spring 2020 Disorientation Guide By the Emerson College Student Union

Welcome back!

We hope you had a great first semester and a restful winter break. By now, you’ve experienced some of Emer$on’s trademark rites of passage. You’ve probably had friends transfer or drop out after being priced out of this school. You’ve probably cried at least once about all of the debt you’re going in to stay here. And now, in all likelihood, you’re about to experience your first tuition increase. Now that will officially make you an Emersonian!

This Dis-Orientation guide gets into some hard truths about Emer$on. But we’re not going to leave you hanging with all of the bad stuff -- that would be depressing and unproductive!

This guide is filled with ways you can help organize to stop the increases. We want to empower you so you don’t feel as helpless as we did when we were freshmen and tuition went up. Let’s build a campus movement for student power that spans generations of Emer$on students!

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In this zine: 4..............Why we think an increase is coming 5..............Students Speak Out 6..............Tuition Increase Bullshit Meter 8..............What is a Student Union?

10..............Questions for the Board 11..............Sources

About Us: The Emerson College Student Union is a non-hierarchical organization of students committed to changing Emerson College’s classist structure through organizing and community care.

We stand for justice for the Emer$on students the college system was built to exclude-- including low income students, students of color, and queer students. We are a platform for all student voices to speak out. We believe that student power is key to liberation for us all.

For more information, visit our website at: ecstudentunion.home.blog.

To join the Union, email us at: EmersonCollegeStudentUnion@gmail.com.

How do we know?

Before anyone accuses us of “fear-mongering,” let’s go into the likelihood that another increase is coming.

• Tuition and fees, and the cost of living on campus have increased every year since 2010.1 • Emer$on’s Board of Trustees have not publicly promised to stop the increases any time soon.

In fact, when asked about halting increases after last year’s increase, Pre$ident Lee Pelton said: “I wouldn’t wish to commit the college to a promise they cannot keep.”2 • The cost of attendance has increased 53.94% over the last 10 years.1 (Can you believe that when this year’s graduating class was freshmen, tuition and fees were $40,044? Now, it’s $46,852!)1 Cost of Attendance Over the Decade:

Graph made by us, using data from collegetuitioncompare.com. COA = room and board + tuition and fees + average books and supplies cost.

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#StudentsSpeakOut

Check out our Instagram for more stories. “the tuition is 3x my family’s annual income, and my institutional aid was not increased to match despite my family losing half its income and our house. the only reason i was able to remain at emerson was a family friend co-signing a private loan, an immense act of charity many students won’t get. every time i asked financial aid for help, they told me they felt bad but their hands are tied. i have no idea if i’ll graduate or not.”

- Anonymous student, class of 2022 “I have to drop out lol.”

- Anonymous student, would have been class of 2021 “I feel more and more at home everyday at Emerson yet I have daily thoughts of dropping out to prevent any more increase in debt. I have panic attacks every once in a while whenever I think of how much I owe and what plan I need to form to pay it off.”

- Anonymous student, class of 2022 “My parents will have to choose between my father and sister’s medical bills and me getting an education. The debt is enormous.”

- Anonymous student, class of 2023 “The increasing tuition and lack of financial aid/consistent financial aid between years has put my whole family at risk of losing our house. Due to the careless mistakes and lack of communication from finaid and the constant tuition increases, I spend my time at Emerson in constant fear of what comes next. Decreasing tuition would mean the whole world to me. I wouldn’t have the giant boulder on my chest that is my situation anymore.”

- Anonymous student, Class of 2021

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Bullshit Meter Every tuition increase is accompanied by a tide of bullshit from the administration. We’ve ranked reasons they’ve cited for tuition increases in the past by how bullshitty they are!

“We increased the budget for financial aid!”

The money for more scholarships and financial aid is already in the budget - it just needs to be reallocated. (Take, for example, Lee Pelton’s $929,0003 salary, a 120% percent increase4 from what he made when he first started working here in 2011. Somehow they found they money to cover that). Furthermore, the increase in financial aid they offer to individual students frequently does not go up in proportion to the tuition increase. Increasing tuition in order to increase financial aid creates a bigger problem, not a solution.

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“The increases haven’t deterred enrollment at all, so they can’t be that bad!”

Enrollment has gone up but this statement doesn’t account for the number of students who have to leave Emerson due to tuition increases. 1 in 5 students don’t graduate from Emer$on.5 Wildly expensive tuition shuts out low-income students.

It ensures that even as our enrollment goes up, the enrolling student body just gets comprised of wealthier students (and poor students willing to go into crushing debt).

“We’ve added x new study abroad program for students!”

Okay, so they definitely added the new study abroad program-- and it definitely was expensive.

The bullshit lies in the fact that we, the students, weren’t asked if we wanted to the program, or if we thought it was worth the increase. What good is another study abroad program most students can’t afford when so many students go into absurd debt just to attend classes on the Boston and L.A. campus? (and skip meals, and take on two jobs, and drop out…)

“Our competitors, like Boston College Brandeis University, and Northeastern University, charge even higher tuition!

(So count yourself lucky!)”

Let’s call this reason a giant dump. Other colleges extorting even more money from students does not excuse Emer$on’s war on poor students. Yes, tuition and fees at these colleges are over $50,000, while Emerson tuition is $46,852. But guess what these colleges do for financial aid? On average, Brandeis university meets 94% of student need, and Boston College and Northeastern University meet 100%. Emerson, on average, meets only 64% of student need.

And yes, colleges increasing tuition is a national trend, but don’t you think it’s pretty shitty of Emer$on to market itself with the motto “Expression necessary to evolution” but to refuse to, ya know, express and evolve beyond our classist college system?

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What is ECSU? “We are students for the expansion of rights for students. We are students for racial justice in higher education. We are students for justice for all people on the gender spectrum. We are students for the end of exploitation of students. We are students for equitable treatment of staff and faculty. We are students for the end of the injustice of graduate students’ exploited labor. We are students for the cooperative ownership of education. We are the Emerson College Student Union.”

-excerpt of our evolving and collaborative manifesto.

We are run by and for Emer$on students, independent of Emer$on College. This means we are not an SGA recognized org, nor do we aim to be, and we do not receive funding from Emer$on. This independence gives us the freedom to push back on the institution of Emer$on without fear of being defunded or kicked off campus.

We are a non-hierarchical group, which means we have no formal leadership positions-- we all work together as equals. We believe that students deserve an equally weighted vote in every place where decisions are made.

We invite you to join and organize with us. Our work is incomplete without your perspective.

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To join our team of organizers, email us at emersoncollegestudentunion@gmail.com. To see more of our manifesto, visit ecstudentunion.home.blog.

What we’ve done: • Created a meal swipes group where students can share guest meal swipes with students in need.

• Published two Disorientation Guides detailing the need for student power and how to build it.

• Built a free textbook library, soon-to-be located in front of the Iwasaki Library, where students can drop off unwanted textbooks so students who need them can take them for free.

• Fostered community through hosting movie nights.

• Consolidated information about resources available to low-income students on our website.

• Been endorsed by the staff union and discussed how we can be allies to one another.

What we will do: • Win students equal voting representation on the Board of Trustees.

• Get the board to make their minutes and voting records publicly accessible.

• Campaign for a tuition freeze and a halt to excessive campus spending without student input.

• Build up the campus food pantry to be better stocked and include non-perishables.

• Win access to the Dining Hall for all students to decrease food insecurity.

• Expand resources and the visibility of resources for low-income students.

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Questions for the Board: • How come student worker’s pay has remained stagnant at minimum wage when tuition and fees and the cost of living on campus have increased every year for the past 10 years?1 • Why do you push students to rely on the food pantry and student success fund to survive when you could address the root problem-- that tuition costs too much for many students to get a degree and eat?

• How come Lee Pelton makes $929,4563 a year while some adjunct professors scrape by on an average of $28,4498 a year? (A living annual wage for just one adult with no children in Boston is $30,577)9 • Can you look an adjunct professor in the eyes and tell them that Lee Pelton’s work is over 32 times more valuable than theirs?

• Why has Lee Pelton’s income increased 120%4 since he first took office? Just a 100k pay cut for him would cover the Boylston meal plan for 153 off-campus students10 -- and he’d still be sitting comfortably making over 800k a year and living rent-free in a Beacon Hill mansion.

• Lee Pelton, how come you advocated for Amazon HQ to come to Boston11 when Amazon is notorious for placing its employees in exploitative conditions12 and the company is so closely tied to ICE?13 10

• How come you “forget” to invite union leaders to meetings where decisions will be made that affect their lives?14 • Why do you now require students to live on campus for their first 6 semesters7 but continue to skyrocket the housing costs annually?1 • How come you only hired two new financial aid employees since 2018,15 totalling 11 employees?16 That’s 346 enrolled undergraduate students per 1 financial aid employee.17 (And that’s not even including the prospective student count.) No wonder it’s hard to get an appointment and our needs fall through the cracks!

• Why don’t students have a formal voting position on the Board where we can ask these questions, get real answers, and influence change?

Sources: 1 Emerson College Tuition Trends. Retrieved from https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/trends/emerson-college/cost-of-attendance/.

2 Hadfield, A. (2019, March 28). Returning students to see 4 percent tuition hike.

Retrieved from https://berkeleybeacon.com/returning-students-to-see-4-percenttuition-hike/.

3 Emerson College. (2017). Form 990 for period ending June 2018. Retrieved from https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/display_990/41286950/06_2019_prefixes_01-06%2F041286950_201806_990_2019062816451694.

4 Emerson College. (2011). Form 990 for period ending June 2012. Retrieved from https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/display_990/41286950/2013_07_EO%2F04-1286950_990_201206.

5 Emerson College Graduation Rate Trends. Retrieved from https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/trends/emerson-college/graduation-rate/.

7 Residency Requirement. (2019, November 27). Retrieved from https://www.emerson.edu/policies/residency-requirement.

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Sources, cont: 8 Emerson College Adjunct Professor Salaries. Retrieved from https://www.paysa. com/salaries/emerson-college--adjunct-professor.

9 Living Wage calculator. Retrieved from https://livingwage.mit.edu/metros/14460.

10 Meal Plans. Retrieved from http://www2.emerson.edu/billing/resources/mealplans.

11 Buskirk, C. V. (2019, January 22). Pelton supported Boston’s effort to attract Amazon’s second headquarters. Retrieved from https://berkeleybeacon.com/ pelton-supported-bostons-effort-to-attract-amazons-second-headquarters/.

12 Campbell, A. F. (2019, October 18). The problem with Amazon’s speedy shipping, in one graphic. Retrieved from https://www.vox.com/identities/2019/10/18/20920717/amazon-shipping-workers-injuries.

13 Hao, K. (2019, October 8). Amazon is the invisible backbone of ICE’s immigration crackdown. Retrieved from https://www.technologyreview.com/s/612335/amazon-is-the-invisible-backbone-behind-ices-immigration-crackdown/.

14 Purifoy, S. (2019, December 14). Union leaders appeal for representation in Emerson-Marlboro merger talks. Retrieved from https://berkeleybeacon.com/ union-leaders-appeal-for-representation-in-emerson-marlboro-merger-talks/.

15 Financial Aid. (2018, December 12). Retrieved from https://web.archive.org/ web/20181212011954/https://www2.emerson.edu/financial-aid/contact.

16 Financial Aid. (2019). Retrieved from https://www2.emerson.edu/financial-aid/contact.

17 About Emerson. (2019, November 27). Retrieved from https://www.emerson.edu/ about-emerson.

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