How Dollars De-value Education: An Opinion

Disclaimer: Any and all opinions expressed in this post belong to the author alone and are not necessarily shared with LESS T or any of its members.

In my second year of university, one of my friends, who came from a financially comfortably family, got a part time job tutoring students. After a few weeks, we happened to meet and she asked, "how do you find any time to have a social life?" I told her the truth, I really didn't. Between being a full-time student with the regular 16 credits and 10-14 hour work weeks, I was hard pressed to find time to actually go out and party like Hollywood says I did. If I was spending time with friends, it would just be at home, since I lived with two of them. But how does this translate into the problem of rising tuition?
Easy, time is money. Since there are students who do not have wealth parents trying to work hard and climb the socio-economic ladder (AKA the American dream), they need to work. Some of them work part-time, some full-time, some take a year (or two or three) off to get enough money in order to finance their living expenses. Invariably, many of these students also apply for scholarships, grants, award money, and lastly and most expensively, loans. The financial burden that students face pressure them to finish their degrees as quickly as they can, anyway they can. Some universities, schools, and/or departments also have unit caps, so the students need to finish their work within a certain number of units in order to graduate, otherwise they have basically just wasted their time. But if one is working during most of their non-class time, when are you supposed to do homework, study, or care about the subject? You end up letting some classes slide.
"Oh, but Yann, you're a grad student, so everything you do is of interest to you/your major, you don't need to deal with general ed. requirements!" Not true! I am fortunate enough to not have to worry too much about student debt. In fact, as long as I keep my GTF-ship, I'm good to go, as far as budget goes, but that does not mean I have loads of free time to care about every class I'm in. My unfortunate example happens to be French. I have nothing against French. It's a relatively easy romance language that helps with English and German etymology, and the added bonus of a lot of philosophers and literary critics use French. But I have a thesis, and grading, and conferences, and department functions, and union business, and friends and family to worry about. French does not help me write about terrorists in the German literary tradition as much as I thought it would, but it's a department requirement that I learn a second foreign language to a second year proficiency. Unfortunately on the list of priorities, French 202 is probably the last thing I care about. Why? because I just don't have time. I watch "Wakfu" and listen to Stromae and MC Solaar, but do I care about what question 5 of tonight's homework is? No, do I care if it's right or not? no. I only really care about is passing this class, and the next class, so I can get my degree. 700 out of 1000 points, that's it, nothing else matters. And this is the same situation, if not worse, that other students also face.
If you don't have enough money and are working all of your free time in order to try to pay for school, then you really aren't going to get as much out of the education as others. Hell, if you work enough? or if something terrible at home happens? You'd be lucky to be even getting that degree, ever. This is how tuition translates to education quality. You just don't have time to care about anything else except money, and the school's bursar office does not care about anything except your money.
-Yannleon Chen, MA student and GTF of the Department of German and Scandinavian at the University of Oregon.

The Math Checks Out

 In case there was any doubt left in your mind about the funding that the UO has been hanging onto and not using on our education, while increasing our tuition, here is the link to the Howard Bunsis report on the 91 million dollar surplus that our university had in 2011.

Special thanks to our brothers and sisters at United Academics for hosting this presentation on their website.

http://uauoregon.org/wp-content/blogs.dir/75/files/2012/02/Update-of-OUS-and-UO-financial-situation-Bunsis-February-2012.pdf

Student Debt is State Debt

A recent article by Oregon Live details the problems that debt is causing. Oregon's economy, along with the rest of the country, is not recovering fast enough for the state to cover all of its debts. So how do they decide to try to fix this? The state's response to students trying to avoid a slumping economy is to saddle them with debt as well. Now the student debt (which they cannot pay back due to the increase in tuition) has been added to state debt, even though a degree would benefit the economy in the long run.

Full article here.
http://www.oregonlive.com/business/index.ssf/2012/12/a_degree_of_desperation_dimini.html

-Posted on behalf of Judith

Cookies and Activism

Cookies and Activism

For those of you who did not see our fliers (as shown to the left) around the EMU at the University of Oregon, we are providing refreshments and information about our coalition and goals. We will also be brainstorming ideas for further actions in winter quarter. One of the actions includes creating posters with real students holding up signs that represent their actual debt. These posters will then be placed around campus to raise awareness. If you have debt, or even if you don't, we encourage you to come by the Walnut Room in the EMU December 4th, between 5:00-6:30 PM. We hope to see you there!

-Yannleon Chen, Master's student and GTF of the Department of German and Scandinavian at the UO.

Education is not a Commodity!

- Aurora Laybourn-Candlish, Undergraduate student, Department of Philosophy at the University of Oregon.

Education is NOT a Commodity

The “Education is NOT a Commodity” Rally was held by the League of Educators and Students Slashing Tuition (LESST) on Wednesday, October 3rd, 11:30a-1:30p at the EMU Amphitheater on the University of Oregon campus.
LESST is composed of undergraduate and graduate students, especially from the ASUO Multicultural Center and the Graduate Teaching Fellows Federation (GTFF 3544), classified staff from Service Employees International Union (SEIU 503), as well as some faculty members. Our current purpose is simple: raise awareness about the increasing rate of tuition.
This year’s graduating seniors are paying 40-45% more tuition than what they paid as incoming freshmen. Tuition increased 6% for 2010/2011, 9% for 2011/2012, and 6.1% for 2012/2013. Just as tuition is at record levels, so is enrollment, meaning that more students crowd the unexpanded classroom space. Meanwhile, the University of Oregon has an $89 million surplus. Where does tuition money go?
It doesn’t go to paying educators. Graduate Teaching Fellows, who are graduate students that do 31.5% of the teaching and grading at the University, are paid at or below the federal poverty line. The administration uses the high cost of our tuition waivers to justify this low pay for graduate students. Classified staff also struggle for fair wages and benefits. And the faculty recently won a fight against the University and its hired union-busting firm last year as they formed their union, United Academics.
We at LESST do not think education is an investment. As American philosopher, John Dewey, once claimed “Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself.” But that life should not be burdened with student loan debt, nor exhausted by attempting to balance a 40-hour work week to pay for full-time student tuition. These conditions hamper education, and therefore hamper life itself. And that’s a logical syllogism.
Undergrads, grads, faculty, staff, and the community are coming together at a rally to speak together about these issues. The rally featured Beatriz Gutierrez (Vote or Vote, undergraduate student), Karyn Smoot (UO Survival Center, undergraduate student), Thomas Walker (UO Survival Center, undergraduate student), Jacob Barto (GTFF VP Operations, graduate student), Judith Lechner (GTFF president, graduate student), Michael Stern (UO faculty), a member of SEIU (TBA), Phil Barnhart (Oregon House District 11), and Peter DeFazio (US House Representative for Oregon’s 4th district).
There was also a speak-out, which gave space for students and educators to voice their own stories regarding tuition, as well as a march through campus.

-Dana Rognlie, PhD student and Graduate Teaching Fellow, Department of Philsophy at the University of Oregon.