Education for All

Deval Patrick of Massachusetts is talking about issues that seems no one else is discussing. In the Prisoner Reentry community he was one of the first to enforce the campaign of "block the box" in his state. It stops employers from randomly discriminating against those once serving time behind bars. Now, he is proposing free two-year colleges, among the priciest in the nation, for all Massachusetts residents who graduate high school.

This is a bold step and quite the opposite direction from most other states and how our nation is moving. A recent Nation article says that college tuition has outpaced the rate of inflation for the past 16 years and some private schools are charging $40,000 to attend. Students are being forced to take on "unprecedented debt to an industry mired in scandals." The Nation authors refer to the unethical practices in the student loan industry first reported on by Campus Progress that "employees of some colleges and universities have promoted certain private loans to students while earning kickbacks from the respective loaning companies."

In response to all this Deval Patrick of Massachusetts, only the second black Governor in our nation's history, outlined a plan to make community college free to everyone. I am a product of community college. That education was instrumental in getting my head straight so I could move on to a four year college and beyond (see photo at left, me and my fellow community college students in the 80s). I met countless dedicated teachers who saw in me someone who could achieve. That is now over 16 years ago when the education was nearly free. Community colleges are full of immigrants, older students, those struggling with poverty, the working class and the confused. We should give those not given much in their previous eighteen years something in the next two.

I don't think Patrick should stop there. We should make state colleges much more affordable. As the government made student loans available to students, college tuition shot up and obviously the student carries that burden. But, this also did not stay stagnant as the Nation reports: In 2006, with the passage of the Deficit Reduction Act, the federal government cut $12.7 billion from the education budget– the largest cut in the nation’s history. And Pell Grants, a key source of aid for low-income students, have remained stagnant and only pay for about a third of a college education, down from 60 percent 20 years ago.

Here are some quick facts by Campus Progress that illustrate how dire the situation has become:

• Over six and ten college students are burdened with an unmanageable debt and this hits African-Americans and Hispanics the hardest.
  
• Total student debt in the United States is more than $438 billion – and that’s not including private loans.
  
• Between 2001 and 2010, 2 million academically qualified students will not go to college because they can't afford it.
  
• The average student today graduates with (almost unmanageable debt) debt almost three and a half times that of graduates a decade ago -- and enters a job market where the average job pays them less than it would have in 2000. Unmanageable debt is defined as the salary-to-debt threshold at which an individual is only able to repay his/her loans with significant economic hardship. For more facts go to Campus Progress and for action on reducing student debt go to the Project on Student Debt.

Our government invests in war, tax breaks for the wealthy, tax loopholes for the rich and for corporations, but claims there is no money for the average citizens of this country. It is time to stop the avalanche and the stealing of our money. Every state in the nation should follow Deval Patrick's lead.


The photo at right is a group of students who participate in the Paterson YMCA's summer LEAP program that provides leadership training, job skills and academic enrichment for Paterson teens. They live in a city where the state-run public school system has failed them, and the high school drop out rate is one of the worst in the state.