(NewsNation) — Harvard University recently encouraged its graduate students to enroll in government food assistance programs amid ongoing discussions about its immense wealth and growing scrutiny regarding the extent of support provided to its student community.
Harvard’s Health Services office circulated a flier promoting a sign-up event encouraging graduate students to participate in the SNAP program, Yahoo Finance reported.
The flyer’s message emphasized the importance of maintaining nourishment and a stocked pantry, highlighting the potential eligibility of grad students for aid in covering food and grocery expenses.
Renowned as the wealthiest academic institution on a global scale, Harvard University boasts a substantial endowment of approximately $53 billion.
Given this considerable financial resource, Harvard possesses the capacity to support a broad spectrum of academic initiatives, research undertakings, scholarship opportunities and programs.
“Harvard’s endowment right now is over $50 billion. Undergraduate tuition is $55,000 a year. And the grad students who do most of the teaching, advising, mentoring at Harvard are so underpaid that they’re eligible for food stamps?” asked host Leland Vittert. “Hardly seems fair.”
In the article by Yahoo Finance, the Harvard Graduate Students Union (HGSU) expressed its view that the university should take more substantial measures to assist graduate students, primarily by increasing their salaries.
The HGSU’s proposal calls for a minimum annual salary of $60,000 for all graduate student workers, a significant jump from the current minimum of $40,000.
HGSU believes that by providing adequate compensation directly to students, the need for external assistance programs like SNAP could be alleviated.
Vittert suggested the government take away the tax-free status of endowments, saying universities should not be able to rely on subsidies both from the federal government for their tax-free endowments and subsidies for food stamps to pay their professors.
Chris Hahn, NewsNation political contributor and host of the “Aggressive Progressive” Podcast and a syndicated radio show, weighed in, saying, “If they are getting these subsidies from the federal government, they should have that taken away to the amount that people are actually applying for food stamps.”
