Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, October 15, 1995 TAG: 9510160001
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: ELIZABETH OBENSHAIN
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Each of the valley's legislative candidates is so determined to be the most vociferous champion of higher education that one even says his blood runs "orange and maroon."
Although candidates from both parties are lining up behind higher education, no one should be too optimistic because of the size of the task ahead.
Virginia has fallen from 29th to 43rd in the nation in per-student funding for higher education in just six years. Parents each year have had to shoulder an increasing burden of college costs.
How much money and how many years will it take Virginia to reverse this trend even if legislators elected this fall are sincerely committed to higher education?
The financial picture for the state's universities could be aggravated by cuts at the federal level, too.
I have to wonder how this makes sense.
At a time when we are struggling to keep our lead in an increasingly competitive, high-tech world, why are we making it harder for students to attend college?
The threat of college tuition hangs over families from the time their children are born. College costs have become so staggering that parents could be expected to shudder rather than rejoice on learning they have a bright child.
Senate Republicans have promised to cut $10.2 billion from the federal student-loan program over the next seven years to help attain their goals of balancing the federal budget, cutting taxes and increasing defense spending. This past month, Senate Republicans proposed charging universities a 2 percent fee for all student loans. This move would have cost universities - and their students - $4.5 billion over those seven years. A rebellion by several Republican senators derailed the proposal in committee.
In defense, Republicans such as Sen. Nancy Kassebaum of Kansas, who led the effort, may have been seeking to avoid even more unpleasant changes in student loan programs - such as requiring students to pay interest on loans while still in college.
Even the federal loans themselves are a step backwards as the government has cut many of its grant programs. Students and their parents have borrowed more than $100 billion just in the past five years and some families now face being overwhelmed by their debt.
It's hard to understand why higher education has become a political budget target. What more middle-class issue could you find than helping families with college costs?
Perhaps it is understandable only when we realize we have boxed ourselves into making unpleasant choices by our campaign budget promises. If we promise no new taxes, increased funding for prisons and more money for higher education, we may find these promises impossible to keep. Will higher education again be the step-child that loses out?
One college, tiny Berea in Kentucky, provides a free education for its students.
Amazing concept - allowing deserving students to attend college free.
A truly radical idea.
Actually, a conservative idea - if a student has worked hard and is deserving, that he should have the right to attend college and make something of himself.
Or a liberal idea - a bright student would not be denied an education because his parents are poor.
Why then can't legislators agree on making college education more affordable?
They will have to be the sort who can make tough and realistic choices in the face of conflicting messages from the voters who want it all without having to pay the price.
by CNB