Greetings, President of the United States here. I stand before you today to address the issue of young Americans not being able to get a quality education due to insufficient funding. To change this, we must make college education more affordable for the lower class. According to National Center for Education Statistics, in 2010 21 million students attended college, but when fall of 2018 came around only 19.9 million students attended college (Fast Facts). I believe that the decrease in student admissions is due to the increasing costs of college tuition. Instead of increasing tuition and limiting who can and can’t go to college, we should be decreasing tuition costs, so college can be more affordable to everyone.
The idea of having discounted or free tuition countrywide has been around since 2014 when Germany became the first country to introduce free tuition. Finland, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway also have the option of obtaining free or discounted tuition. Tuition in these countries has been free for all students worldwide until recently when they had to start introducing some restrictions. For example, Finland, Sweden, and Norway all offer free tuition, but only to natives of their country. If foreign students still wish to attend they must pay a small fee of 1500 euros which is equivalent to roughly 1750 American dollars. Germany also offers free tuition, but only to students residing in Europe. International students must pay admission fees similar to the ones found in Finland, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway(Gibbons). Even though these European countries have just begun adding admission prices to their universities, there still exists a substantial gap between what they pay, and what we pay here in the United States.
Certain states throughout the United States have also begun offering discounted tuition. These states include Rhode Island, Oregon, New York, and Tennessee. The Rhode Island Promise Scholarship allows for students attending community colleges to get free tuition if they have recently graduated high school, are able to maintain a GPA over 2.5 whilst being enrolled in the University, and they must reside in the state of Rhode Island (Lobosco). The Rhode Island Promise scholarship is very similar to the Oregon Promise scholarship except that Oregon requires that the applicant must not have attempted to complete more than 90 credits already, and the applicant can’t have parents or guardians who are able to contribute more than 18,000 dollars to the student’s tuition (Lobosco).
This can be determined by using the Free Application for Federal Student Aid also known as FAFSA. While colleges in Rhode Island, and Oregon only offer tuition to community colleges, New York offers tuition to public universities also by following the Excelsior Act. Using the Excelsior Act, New York is able to offer students up to $5500 per year to help pay for tuition. The restrictions that apply to the Excelsior Act include the student must have a high school GPA higher than 3.0, come from a household where the total income is less than 125 thousand dollars, take 30 credits a semester, and reside in the state of New York for at least one year prior to applying (Anonymous). Even though these acts include many restrictions for students, they are a step in the path towards lowering tuition costs.
The benefits of more students attending college are endless. First, it’s great for our countries GDP. By not having to pay so much for their children to go to college, parents are more likely to spend money on something else. Also, according to a book written by the college board, a student who attended college in 2011 and had a full-time occupation made roughly 21,100 dollars more annually than someone who only had a high school degree (Baum, Ma & Payea 2013). Thus, students who attend college are able to spend more money than those who don’t further boosting our countries GDP. The unemployment rate in 2012 for graduates of a four-year institution was 7.1% less than that of students who only obtained a high school diploma. By getting a college diploma and getting a job we are working to reduce the amount of homelessness, poverty, and therefore crime found throughout the United States. Another benefit of decreasing tuition costs includes adults with a college degree are more likely to vote and volunteer. According to the College Board, 42% of four-year college graduates volunteered while only 17% of high school graduates volunteered in an organization. As I had mentioned earlier, voting also increases when being intertwined with a college education. Adults with age ranging from 45-64 years old with a college degree were 21% more likely to vote in the 2012 election (Baum, Ma &Payea 2013).
My solution to this crisis is making college more affordable by passing an act similar to the one passed in New York where students can receive free college. The student has to have been a citizen in the United States for over a year, have a total household income of less than 125 thousand dollars, and have a cumulative high school GPA greater than 3.2. By creating restrictions like these we are able to eliminate many of the students who don’t deserve to go to college. The money to pay for tuitions will be funded by cutting military spending. According to chart number one that was released by the Peterson G Foundation, in 2017 the United States spent approximately 610 billion dollars on the military alone. This is more than the next seven countries combined (U.S. spending compared to other countries). Why do we need to be spending an astronomical amount on our military when we are in a time currently where our relations with most other countries are going fairly well? According to one of my former colleagues, Bernie Sanders who made an attempt to create a bill very similar to mine, it would cost the United States around 47 billion dollars annually to support students in need of financial aid in order to attend college (Wellman). If we cut military spending by only 7.75% we would then be able to fund an act where poverty-stricken, smart, hardworking individuals are able to have a chance at achieving the American dream.
In conclusion, I would like to say if we don’t figure out a way to decrease the costs of tuition soon, we will continue to lose an abundance of knowledge that could be used to further enhance our country as a whole.
