ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, October 11, 1996 TAG: 9610110051
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 VIRGINIA EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: DUBLIN
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
Simone Gabriel, a single parent of three children, is in her third semester of a police science curriculum at New River Community College, thanks to financial aid programs.
Her goals are to get her associate degree at New River and a bachelor's degree in criminal justice from Radford University, and eventually to become an FBI agent. Despite her determination to reach those goals, she says, it would be more difficult, if not impossible, if she were not getting financial aid.
Naturally, she hopes whoever is elected to Congress from the 9th District will support continued financial aid funding at the federal level.
"I know that I'm going to get the education that I need, but I hope I'm going to get the financial aid that I need," she said. "I'm able to afford college through financial aid. I get a full financial aid grant to put me through school. I do run into problems because I'm a single parent."
She and her three daughters - Diamond, 10; Parise, 9; and Raven, 3 - have lived in Radford since 1994. Gabriel decided to move to the New River Valley from New Jersey after visiting a family friend who lives here. She arrived in a 24-foot U-Haul, with her children riding shotgun.
Since then, she said, "nothing but good things have happened to me." After working for a time at the check-out counter at the Fairlawn Kmart, she got herself into college and is pleased with Diamond's and Parise's schools.
"We have a lot in common. We're all in school. My two oldest and I, we compete for who's going to get the better grade. It just about kills me when I make anything less than a C," she said, and she seldom does. Usually she is on the honor roll.
Because of her small frame, people she meets for the first time have trouble believing first, that she is 29 years old and second, that she is a police science student. "No one takes me seriously," she joked. But she is proud of being 29 and "I'm going to be equally proud to say that I'm an FBI agent one day."
But without the financial aid she gets, she said, "I don't know what I would do. I really don't it would take me a very long time to complete my goal." New River Community College has helped her secure that assistance.
"Their financial aid department is great," she said. "They help you a lot." She quotes Malcolm X on the need for self-improvement: "Education is our passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to the people who prepare for it today."
"How do they know that a person who invents the cure for AIDS isn't going to be the person who needs those funds?" she said. If money for financial aid is cut, she argued, there is no telling what would be lost in the way of future leaders.
Rep. Rick Boucher, D-Abingdon, agrees with Gabriel on the need for financial aid.
"We should enact President Clinton's recommendations for a tax credit of approximately $2,500 per year for students who want to attend either community colleges or four-year colleges or vocational schools," he said. If the student pays no taxes, he said, the proposal would allow the student to receive the $2,500 benefit toward education. The other answer to Gabriel's need, he said, is to increase the federal commitment to guaranteed student loans, Pell grants and other kinds of loans to students.
Republican challenger Patrick Muldoon of Pembroke and Virginia Independent Party candidate Tom Roberts of Blacksburg believe student loans and part-time jobs are answers to getting an education. That was how they did it.
"There are college loans available," Muldoon said, as well as part-time jobs to help cover the cost of education. "I still have college loans myself that I'm paying off now. That's basically how I got through."
Muldoon conceded that it would not be easy to get an education that way, requiring sacrifices of both money and time. But the loans are out there, he said. It may not be easy to get them, "but the hard work pays off in the long run. Nobody's going to give you a handout."
"We can make more loans available, but they are still loans. But those opportunities should be allowed."
Roberts agreed on student loans being a wise federal investment.
"This is not a pork-barrel project," he said. "This is really something that does offer a chance for people to get a good education and contribute back to society. It's not a handout, because it's a loan."
If there were no fiscal crisis at the federal level, he said, he would favor expanding financial aid such as Pell grants, "but I'm afraid we don't have the money."
Like Muldoon, he found loans and jobs to help pay for his education. "It was really tough to get by," he said. "To tell you the truth, I'm still paying on some of them. I'm not one of those who reneged."
Gabriel liked Boucher's endorsement of Clinton's tax credits. "I think that's a good idea," she said. For someone in her position, though, student loans are not the answer, she said.
She would have to start repaying them six months after graduation, and "I can't do that. I'm not in that position where I can add extra bills." She already has the expenses of her children, food, rent and medical care to handle, she said.
"Perhaps you don't find a job; what are you going to do? That's something that must be repaid," she said. "It's just too risky. If I have to do it, I have to do it," but she does not see how she could handle loan payments on top of her other responsibilities. "I'm not a teen-ager; I'm knocking on 30."
She does not argue with Roberts on holding the line on financial aid funding. "I'm not even proposing to increase it. I'm just saying don't decrease it any more," she said. "Don't make us have to be forced to go out and get student loans."
LENGTH: Long : 108 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: PAUL DELLINGER/Staff. Simone Gabriel of Radford is aby CNBpolice science student at New River Community College in Dublin.
color. KEYWORDS: POLITICS CONGRESS