The ban will limit graduate students’ professional development and job prospects. Graduate students seek out these jobs in order to supplement graduate work, to gain further knowledge in areas related to their fields, and to practice practical application of academic training—in short, to develop their professional selves while completing graduate work. These work opportunities offer Brown graduate students a critical edge on the tight academic job market, and they are essential for those whose professional goals require demonstrated work outside of the dissertation.

The ban will adversely impact the quality of graduate students’ research. Working helps to off-set the financial costs of fieldwork, archival visits and conference travel, which are necessities of completing graduate study. Existing conference funds are insufficient, and in many disciplines, outside funding and grants are scarce.

This ban will imperil graduate students’ financial survival. Graduate students who have no other means of income outside of their stipend live just over 185% of the official RI poverty line, making economic insecurity the norm for even those without dependents.[2] For graduate students without an economic safety net, for those in academic disciplines in which completing a graduate study takes longer than 5-6 years, and for persons with student loan debt, dependents, expensive health conditions, family obligations, and/or other expenses, outside work is necessary in order to complete graduate study.

This ban will have an adverse effect on Brown’s ability to recruit and retain the most promising and qualified students and on the overall socioeconomic diversity of the graduate student body. This ban will imperil the ability of low-income, first generation and non-traditional students to attend and complete graduate study at Brown University, and it is likely to disproportionately impact students of color. This proposal directly contradicts Brown’s stated commitment “to achieve diversity in our living, learning and working environments by placing emphasis on the recruitment and retention of students, faculty and staff from a wide range of backgrounds and experiences.”[3]

There is no justification for this ban. The graduate school has failed to demonstrate that banning outside work will quicken graduate students’ time to completion or that work commitments have been a problem for graduate students. To the contrary, the added financial strain may very well make completing graduate work at the rate desired by the graduate school more difficult. All graduate students balance multiple demands while remaining in good standing, and they consider this their primary responsibility.