So, I was told this week that because I'm not teaching three sections this semester but two, the university is going to pay me less if I don't sign up for an unpaid tech internship.

Let me list my grievances in order:

1. UVA only pays TAs up to 10 hours per week anyway, a limit that most TAs have to ignore to get their job done (teaching, grading, meeting with students, etc.). I had 45 students last fall and 60 in the spring. I regularly worked overtime, for which the university paid...nothing

2. I was unaware that any TAs taking on a class with less than 35 students would have to make up for it with an unpaid position, essentially doing extra work for the university on top of teaching responsibilities, which is a lot to begin with. I was never told this till this week

3. Over the summer, I was enrolled as a TA in a much larger course, but because of a shift in assistantships, I was moved to my current position without my knowledge or consent. But I liked that I ended up with this prof, who also likes me. When I was asked to move AGAIN....

...a WEEK BEFORE CLASS STARTED, both my and the prof advocated that I should stay. At no point during that conversation with the dean was I told that my current position would pay less because of small enrollment numbers. That would have been a good time for them to tell me, yes?

4. Besides TAing, I have taken on a part-time grant management position and a research assistantship to make enough income to live in C-ville. I'm just about to start taking my comp exams. UVA is now asking me to take on MORE than that. Grad students here make poverty-level wages

5. The amount of work that TAs do for the university sustains the life of the university. If we all stopped grading, for instance, the moment we hit 10 hours of work, everything would stop. With 22 students, they pay less hours than that. If I actually kept the current hour limit

...I would not be able to do my job, hamstringing my teaching and leading to future repercussions based on student evaluations and prof recommendation letters. I'm in a double-bind, which means UVA can restrict my pay whenever it wants and I would have to go along with it.

6. UVA is cracking down like this during a pandemic, in which TAs put more hours of work into prep for virtual teaching amidst the worries of getting sick if the students return to campus. This is one of the shittiest moves by the university against grad students I've seen yet.