MOHELA must focus on helping students pay for school
By Admin, Section From The Wires
By Jay Nixon, St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Affordable college education, even at a state university, is no longer a guarantee for middle-income families in Missouri -- and it is clearly out of reach for most lower-income families. Consider these recent headlines: "Tuition Soars," "Parents Feel the Pinch," "MU Tuition Highest in Big 12," "Missouri Gets an F in College Costs." The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education reports an 11 percent decline between 1992 and 2006 in the number of 18- to 24-year-olds in Missouri attending college. Patrick Callan, the center's president, issued this assessment: "We're in a situation where perhaps for the first time in our history the next generation will not be as educated as the one that came before." The same report shows that a Missouri student from a low- to middle-income family would spend 47 percent of that family's annual income to attend a public four-year college and 34 percent to attend a community college. At a time when Missouri families are struggling to afford tuition, Gov. Blunt is advocating a plan that will make it more difficult for these families to afford college. He has proposed diverting $350 million from the state's student loan fund to help finance construction on our college campuses.
Certainly these new buildings can improve our fine institutions of higher learning, but I believe affordable education is more important than new buildings. New construction should not come at the expense of families caught in the middle-class squeeze and facing a reversal of the American Dream.
Sixty years ago, that dream began for many families with the GI Bill, which expanded college opportunities to all qualifying World War II veterans, regardless of income. For my generation, the sons and daughters of these veterans, affordable college was almost a guarantee if your parents had a job. While many of us worked to help pay our tuition, there was little doubt that we could afford one of Missouri's many excellent colleges or universities and graduate debt-free. Today, at the very time we preach education as necessary to success in the world economy, we are pricing our own children out of the market for higher education. The Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority was established by the Missouri Legislature in 1981 for the purpose of providing low-interest loans. It was established because we, as a state, placed a value on human capital. We understood that broadening access to higher education equaled broadening prosperity. What has happened to those values that we would hijack this fund at the very time when low-interest loans are needed most? All the experts tell us that to prosper and grow, our state must produce, recruit and retain professionals in the fields of engineering, math, science and computer science. Our investment must be in human capital. The governor's proposal not only runs contrary to the purpose of MOHELA, but it also ignores the priority building needs that have been established by the Coordinating Board for Higher Education. In fact, half the proposal's building projects are not even listed as priorities by the CBHE, which is the very board established to evaluate and prioritize building proposals for our campuses. Rather than squander $350 million on political plums being handed out in an election year, our state leaders should use MOHELA for the purpose it was intended. If MOHELA has the ability to produce $350 million more in additional revenue, we must expand its ability to invest in human capital. Low-interest loans and loan forgiveness can help train our work force for the demands of the world economy. They also can help get money into the hands of our neediest students, including the 35,000 students who qualified for need-based scholarships last year but were turned away. With this money, we can expand the number of students attending technical schools, community colleges and work force training programs. An expanded MOHELA can train licensed practical nurses to be registered nurses and educate laborers so they can work in advanced high-tech manufacturing. These funds can provide the advanced vocational training our work force requires. I call on Gov. Blunt and the Missouri Legislature to use MOHELA for the purpose established under law: to help our families afford higher education. Source
|
|
American |
|
||
|
All trademarks and copyrights on this page are owned by their respective owners. Comments are owned by the Poster. The Rest ? 2005-2006 the 137th. |
|||
|
The purpose of this site is to serve the public interest: As related to Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, all materials on this site are made available without profit. Reprints are published for permanent archival of public information for the purpose of news reporting, criticism, comment, education and research. Site User/Editors strive to ensure that every user submission includes, at the beginning and end of all re-published material, the original author's name and a direct link to the original source of any and all copyright protected material. |
|||
