Washington Week: Student Voices (O)

COLUMN: Education cuts prove government's lack of interest in progress
By Alaric DeArment
Daily News (Ball State U.)
04/03/2006

(U-WIRE) MUNCIE, Ind. — "Public school," "textbooks" and "pay for" don't sound right in the same sentence.

In Washington — where I'm from — using textbooks, musical instruments and other school equipment didn't cost me a cent. But Indiana residents pay hundreds for the use of their books and materials — from elementary schoolers to high schoolers.

"Our greatest advantage in the world has always been our educated, hardworking, ambitious people — and we're going to keep that edge," President George W. Bush said at his State of the Union Address this year.

He then announced his American Competitiveness Initiative, which he said would encourage innovation and establish firm grounding in math and science for American children.

We certainly won't keep that edge if we skimp on education, forcing school districts to eliminate arts and sciences and forcing their students to pay to use textbooks. For that matter, college students' having to spend $300 on textbooks for each semester will not give us an edge, either.

And the president's proposed budget for fiscal year 2007 also shows a further lack of commitment to education.

According to the Department of Education's budget report, Bush plans to eliminate the Perkins Loan, the Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs (or GEAR-UP), the Leveraging Educational Assistance Program, the Thurgood Marshall Legal Educational Opportunity Program and the Upward Bound and Talent Search programs of TRIO.

All of these programs, according to the student advocacy group United States Student Association, expand opportunities for low-income and underserved individuals to go to college.

It didn't help them when Congress cut the student loan program by $12.7 billion earlier this year.

These are the programs that give poor kids the little financial push they need to become scientists, architects and teachers — thus helping this country stay innovative and competitive. For all we know, some little boys and girls out there have the intelligence and creativity to grow up and cure AIDS or make breakthroughs in nanotechnology and space travel.

But with access to higher education more difficult to obtain thanks to budget cuts, those little kids might never realize their full potentials.

According to the Web site of WPXI, one year of preparing a marine for battle costs $45,300, not including the uniform. By contrast, a year at Ball State University, including room and board, is set to cost about $13,500 for an Indiana resident and slightly less than $24,000 for a student from out of state for the 2006-07 academic year.

Which sounds like a better investment: paying $45,300 for a Hoosier to die in Iraq in exchange for access to cheap oil or spending $13,500 for that Hoosier to get a bachelor's degree and contribute to America's competitiveness?

Our country has twisted its priorities. We'd rather spend half a trillion dollars losing a war for cheap oil than develop public transportation and thus reduce our reliance on cars — as European, Japanese and Chinese people have already done.

We'd rather spend millions of dollars on new sports stadiums than make the use of textbooks free for public school students.

Meanwhile, our politicians would rather debate whether the sky is truly blue than work to make long-term investments in this country and ensure it has a bright future.

Does this sound like the making of a competitive nation? It shouldn't.

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