(Host) More than 300 students from the Vermont State Colleges came to Montpelier on Tuesday to demand that the state boost funding for higher education.
As VPR’s John Dillon reports, the students got a sympathetic ear from college administrators who have long complained that Vermont under-funds its state colleges.
(Dillon) Many of the students wore hand lettered Tee shirts with a dollar figure showing how much they owed in student loans.
(Dempsey) "My number is $15,000. And that’s excluding text books. Text books are probably another $2,000 or $3,000 at least."
(Dillon) James Dempsey is a first generation college student from Lincoln. He says student loans and tuition increases leave students with a crushing debt load.
(Dempsey) "Whole bunch of people are walking around with their debt on their chests. And we’re here to just start a conversation. That’s all we’re trying to do. So hopefully we can get more support and we can look out for the future generations of Vermont. Because if we don’t, poverty levels are going to increase in this state hugely with all this amount of debt."
(Dillon) The state colleges just voted to raise tuition 4 percent for the next two academic years. Dempsey says if tuition continues to increase at that pace – along with similar hikes in room, meals and other charges – four years at a state college will cost about $70,000.
(Dempsey) "Think of how much I have to do to reduce that cost. And if I want to go to graduate school afterwards, that’s tacking on to that additional $70,000. So we have a lot of Vermonters here today who are really trying to get that cost down, raise awareness about it and say, you know, it’s bad now but it’s going to get a lot worse if we continue ignoring it."
(Dillon) The students point out that Vermont provides its colleges with the second-lowest funding per student in the country.
And that’s a message state college administrators have delivered as well. Tim Donovan is chancellor.
(Donovan) "If we look at 1990 -22 years ago – the state appropriation per full-time equivalent student in the state colleges was about $3,300 and now it’s about $2,400, so a 30 percent decline in actual dollars and if you adjust for inflation it’s a 60 percent decline."
(Dillon) Both Donovan and the students noted that President Obama focused on both controlling the cost of higher education and providing more public support for colleges in his recent state of the union address.
(Donovan) "The colleges are hearing yes, we need to contain costs. I hope that the public and public policy makers are hearing we need to decide how important a priority it is that we an educated citizenry."
(Dillon) Donovan says that even with the tuition increase, state colleges will have to make a 2 percent cut in operations.
For VPR News, I’m John Dillon in Montpelier.