Higher ed cuts the true madness of this March
By David Sarasohn, The Oregonian
March 14, 2010, 1:43PM
This week marks the kickoff of the NCAA college basketball playoffs, perhaps the last remaining occasion when Americans use "college" and "revenue increase" in the same sentence. But this month, higher education started March Madness a little early.Higher edMarch 4, college students demonstrated in Oregon and throughout the country to point out they're being charged considerably more and getting less and less, and that the basic quality of the country's higher education system is starting to wobble.
"It's addressing a growing trend and an economic crisis facing students across the nation," explained Stephanie Rio Collier, a Portland State junior and part of a demonstration by several hundred PSU students. They were especially concerned, said Collier, about possible Oregon University System reorganizations that might produce sharply higher tuition and even more student debt.
There are two clear points to make about this:
1. The PSU students, and the ones across the country, are absolutely right.
2. They haven't seen anything yet.
The next legislative sessions around the country, when state budgets will be far from recovering and when federal stimulus money will be gone --at this point, states will be mostly on their own facing combined deficits that could top $200 billion --could be the worst moment for higher education since the end of mandatory Latin.
Warned state Rep. Chip Limehouse, chairman of the higher education subcommittee in the South Carolina House of Representatives, "Next year is going to be an iceberg looming for higher education."