The University probably won’t get the state funds that Undergraduate Student Government would like, but at least USG gave it that old college-funding try.
Governor Bob Taft announced Wednesday that he will likely cut about 2.5 percent from state universities’ budgets to close what he said is a $162 million gap between the current budget and the balanced budget required by federal law.
This news put a damper on USG’s trip to the state capitol yesterday. The group — along with student government members from several other universities in Ohio — scheduled the trip to show law makers the importance of both higher education funding and students’ votes.
But the group couldn’t have predicted that the legislature would have already voted down the taxes Taft proposed to close the gap, which made him decide to cut the higher education’s budget, according to USG President Sarah Saccany.
“If we could’ve been there a day before, that would’ve been fabulous,” Saccany said.
Though USG can’t change the past, their actions yesterday at the capitol can still influence the future.
“Us going shows that not all college students are apathetic,” she said.
Most legislators still see students as non-voters, according to George Ciuca, administrative aide to state Senator Tom Roberts.
“Most of those guys (in the state legislature) are 30 or 40 years old,” Ciuca said. “The last thing they’re thinking about is the cost of going to college. You need to vote for people who say, ‘I’m going to make education a priority.'”
Law makers aren’t the only ones ignoring higher education — voters have been ignoring it, too, according to Ciuca.
For an example, he cited Tim Hagan’s platform for governor last year, which emphasized university funding.
“He lost by a landslide,” Ciuca said.
USG members met with other state officials before leaving a stack of letters with Taft’s secretary — each urged the governor to avoid cutting funds, each warned of a declining education system in Ohio, and each of the 900 letters was signed by a different University student.
The arguments in those letters were similar to those posed to policy makers.
Saccany argued to the aide of one legislator’s aide that jobs in Ohio are already hurting because funding for state universities has slipped to 40th nationwide.
“We think that’s why the economy has taken such a big hit in Ohio,” she said.
With more funding and lower tuition, more people should have access to the institutions they help fund, according to Don Humphrey, a USG member at Firelands College — the University’s branch campus.
“They are all the people that help pay taxes to support the system,” he said.
With university budgets shrinking, the state is considering putting tuition caps in place, which would limit most schools to raising tuition by no more than nine percent.
Tuition caps have benefits, but USG member Justin Dortch said there are still drawbacks.
“College’ll remain affordable, but (the University will) lose professors, they’ll have to cut programs and cut student activities,” Dortch said.
Getting more state support would help keep tuition down while maintaining the quality of education. But, USG has a lot more work to do before this goal is achieved.
To achieve it, Saccany hopes to make another trip to the capitol building in the spring, this time with a larger group. Dortch agrees: “We’ve got small things already established — let’s do something big.”
But the group has done something already, according to USG member Josh Kontak, who helped write the letter that 900 students signed.
“I don’t think we changed any minds, but we showed that students are voters and are concerned with higher education,” he said.
