A Modern Day College Protest Story

My college years were not an easy time for me.  It was not that I had difficulty with the courses nor was it the fact that I attended college during the anti-intellectual, anti-education Reagan years of the 80s.  I faced the same problem that most of my fellow collegians did - how to pay for tuition.  I was always worrying about how I was going to pay for my education.  In fact, I spent almost as much time worrying about how to pay for my classes as I did studying for them.  I eventually did pay for college and graduate with a combination of student loans, grants and work study and through the use of whatever personal saving I had amassed.  As a result of this massive financial push, by the time I graduated, or even before I officially had actually, the student loan people began calling in their markers.

This is why I identify so closely with the college students who, on 100-plus campuses nationwide rallied to protest budget cuts, layoffs and tuition hikes.  They did this Thursday March 4 because these hikes, layoffs and budget cuts are all endangering them from getting the education I was able to eventually obtain.  Of course, our current economic crisis is to blame for the difficult situation students and parents find themselves in.  Due to the state's financial problems California's public education system, for example, has been severely impacted by spending cuts.  Its $20 billion budget deficit has necessitated layoffs and furloughs in many districts and school systems, along with reductions in course offerings and grants.

I understand the necessity to save money somewhere in state budgets but I am concerned that where states find themselves in a budget crisis, right wing legislators will find themselves going after education budgets first and not only as a last resort.  I am concerned that after we Americans have bailed out the banks, they are still reaping upwards of $9 billion a year in subsidies for handling federal student loans.  I am concerned that there is a certain part of the electorate that doesn't mind the greater expense of sending people to prison versus sending them to college.

Underlying these cuts is a certain anti-intellectualism.  There is a certain part of the country that sees a higher education as something impractical and intangible.  Perhaps these elements want a dumber, more malleable electorate.  Perhaps this element doesn't understand that education is an investment in the future.  An educated populace is what makes possible advances in science and medical advances; technological and industry.  Endanger that class and we endanger our culture and negatively impact our future.

The administration's recommendations on how to remedy the crisis in education funding came about in a special task force which announced its proposals on February 26, 2010.  Recommendations, according to the Committee on Education and Labor, include:

·    Capping student loan payments at ten percent of a borrower's income and forgiving debt after twenty years
·    Shifting all federal lending to the Direct Loan program, which would allocate over eighty billion dollars to need-based aid and access and retention programs
·    Making historic investments in community colleges and Minority Serving Institutions
·    Investing $3 billion to bolster college access and completion support programs for students.  This is designed to increase funding for the College Access Challenge Grant program, and will also fund programs at states and institutions that focus on increasing financial literacy and helping retain and graduate students.

An organization that is pushing for even further reform is the United States Student Association (USSA) a 60 year-old student advocacy group.  They are pushing for the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act which passed the House late last year and is currently pending in the Senate.  Let's hope these proposals help to extend the opportunity to great a higher education pass.  In the meantime, I wish all the luck in the world to the USSA and the students who came out in full force all over the country fighting for that most precious right – education.