Split on health insurance points to TC, CU divide

The main entrance to Teachers College sits on 120th Street, right across from the main Columbia campus. But even though TC bills itself as part of the University—the words “Teachers College Columbia University” are embossed across the 120th Street entrance—many TC students say they feel like second-class citizens at Columbia.

While TC has been a Columbia affiliate since 1898, it’s also a financially independent entity, with its own endowment and budget. But a 40 percent jump in premiums for TC students on a Columbia health insurance plan this year, coupled with TC’s relatively low funding levels for doctoral students, has some students frustrated by the lack of a closer relationship between the two schools.

Columbia grants TC students' degrees, the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences administers the degrees to TC’s Ph.D.students, and there is cross-registration between TC and Columbia classes. But TC doctoral student Michelle Hodara, CC ’03, said the idea that TC doctoral students are really GSAS students “just doesn’t mean anything.”

“I don’t even cross the street anymore … it feels very separate,” she said.

Even TC deputy provost John Allegrante, who expressed confidence in a cooperative future for TC and Columbia, said that 120th Street “has been at times referred to as ‘the widest street in the world.’”

‘Let-them-eat-cake-ism’
Columbia administers the health insurance plans for TC, as it does for the Union Theological Seminary and the Jewish Theological Seminary, which are also affiliate schools. Columbia recently decided to split off the health insurance plans for its affiliate schools, leading to a premium increase of $1000 per year for doctoral students on the comprehensive version of the plan.

Many students were outraged by this change, with some seeing it as the latest evidence of an inequality in the University’s treatment of TC students. TC doctoral candidate Rachel Rosen called Columbia’s decision to split off affiliate schools’ health insurance plans a sort of “let-them-eat-cake-ism.”

“We are actually GSAS students, but … Columbia doesn’t treat us [TC Ph.D. students] that way,” she said.

According to a Columbia Health statement issued to Spectator, Columbia tried, during renegotiations with insurance provider Aetna, to avert a larger across-the-board increase in premiums by creating a separate risk pool for students at TC, JTS, and UTS.

The TC student body is older, on average, than the University as a whole—the average TC student is 29—and over 70 percent female, and is thus more expensive to insure.

Ultimately, the separation of the plans led to an approximately 40 percent increase in premiums for students at affiliate schools and an approximately 10 percent increase for all other students.

According to the Columbia Health statement, administrators from TC, UTS, and JTS were involved in the discussions and supported the final changes unanimously. But Allegrante said in an email that the cost increase “was clearly far more than we had expected.”

“What has disturbed the TC community is that while Columbia Health’s action in adopting the change in policy effectively mitigated the increase for its own students under the new plan, it led to a much higher proportion of increase for TC,” he said.

“‘Unanimously agreed’ does not fully describe the events as they unfolded and does not speak to the complexity of the health insurance landscape at the time or the lack of options from which we could choose,” he added.

A Columbia spokesperson declined to comment for this story.

Financial prospects
Rosen started a petition opposing the health insurance changes—it garnered over 50 signatures—and the TC administration held a town hall meeting in September to listen to student concerns. Rosen described the event as “moving,” saying some students revealed that they had to rely on Medicaid for their health care needs.

At that time, administrators announced that some of the neediest students would receive a one-year assistance package equal to the amount of the premium increase. But although administrators have discussed the possibility of more long-term help, Allegrante said he doubts that TC has the funds to provide broad assistance on a permanent basis.

Health insurance isn’t the only issue where TC’s funding is lacking. As Spectator reported last month, compensation for teaching assistants at Teachers College is often just a fifth of the compensation for teaching assistants at Columbia, and TC students who teach in the Core Curriculum make just half of what Columbia students make.

On top of that, TC doctoral students also say that their overall funding packages cannot compete with those at peer institutions or with funding for Columbia’s GSAS students. Jeffrey Henig, a professor in TC’s department of education policy and social analysis, said that while there are many TC professors who “share with the Ph.D. students a wish” to improve funding, TC’s budget is more constrained than budgets at some other schools.

“We are competing for students who look a lot like the Ph.D. students across the street, we are competing with other institutions who have more to offer in terms of funding support,” Henig said.

Administrators have committed in principle to aggressively improving doctoral funding, including TA compensation. Faculty and administrators note that TC has far more doctoral students than competing education schools and other Columbia doctoral programs, and bringing this number down is widely agreed to be an important part of achieving more competitive funding.

Allegrante said that Teachers College is “fully aware of the need” to provide more competitive funding to full-time Ph.D. students, and that a capital campaign taking over the next few years will hopefully make that possible.

“The campaign that will begin unfolding is going to be an opportunity to address this, and my own hope is that—and I think we will be able to do this—is that we will be able to commit many, many more dollars than we do now to students that will be coming to the college in the next decade,” he said.

‘A huge mystery’
Still, some students doubt that TC can ever approach doctoral-funding parity with education schools at places like Harvard University, Stanford University, and Vanderbilt University, where the education schools are direct parts of the overall universities—not affiliates.

Doctoral student Ruaridh MacLeod, a former TC representative in the University Senate, said that it’s a “huge mystery” to students why TC doesn’t receive more financial support from the University.

“It is patently clear that the college, as a going concern on its own, doesn’t have a particularly… illustrious financial prospect ahead of it,” MacLeod said.

Although some funds pass across 120th to account for mutual cross-registration, Allegrante said that the latest version of the affiliation agreement between Columbia and TC—which was written in 1965—states that Columbia is under absolutely no obligation to provide for “the physical maintenance or fiscal management of the College.”

“We are responsible for raising all of the institutional resources that enable us to run the institution. We do not draw on the Columbia University endowment,” Allegrante said. “And I think that’s where the confusion sometimes comes.”

MacLeod isn’t alone, though, in thinking that TC would benefit from a closer relationship with Columbia. Robert McClintock, who recently retired after more than 40 years as a TC professor, said that there would be many benefits to closer integration between TC and Columbia, even if it would be opposed by some TC faculty.

“Most people say … the University is going to more and more envelop Teachers College as it moves uptown, and there I think will be a growing case for the eventual merging of Teachers College into Columbia,” he said.

‘Not going to happen’
Allegrante noted that the TC’s relationship with Columbia has “waxed and waned” over the years. TC Provost Tom James and former Columbia Provost Alan Brinkley had agreed to form a joint task-force to explore academic cooperation between the two schools, but this effort was stalled by the departures of Brinkley and then of his successor, Claude Steele, Allegrante said.

If these discussions were to happen, health insurance and pay for Core teachers, in addition to cooperation on faculty hiring, “would probably be on the table as well,” he said.

TC Student Senate president Vikash Reddy said he thinks that a complete integration of the two schools is “not going to happen.” He believes that TC could make the nature of its relationship with Columbia clearer to current and prospective students.

“TC certainly sells the Columbia University portion of the name there, and Columbia also talks about TC as its education school,” he said. “Sometimes the affiliate status isn’t necessarily explained well or isn’t necessarily understood well.”

Allegrante said that the TC website mentions the affiliate status, and that he personally mentions it when he addresses prospective students. Still, for Keith Miller, TC’s student representative in the University Senate, the disconnect between the two schools came as a surprise.

“When I was looking to get into a graduate school, I couldn’t really find any information that detailed what’s happening at Teachers College. I didn’t know that Teachers college is an affiliate school,” Miller said. “I thought it was a full-fledged part of Columbia University.”

henry.willson@columbiaspectator.com

Correction: The original version of this story stated that GSAS grants the degrees for TC doctoral students. Columbia University grants all TC degrees, and GSAS administers the degrees for TC Ph.D. students. Spectator regrets the error.