The effects of an underfinanced Illinois budget could trickle down to undercut the people who want an education but can least afford it.
About 5,000 students at Southern Illinois University Carbondale are desperately dependant upon money that’s not there for them come January because $200 million-plus for the Monetary Award Program is missing from this year’s state budget.
Gov. Pat Quinn has proposed a $1 cigarette tax to save the 138,000 students in the state who rely on MAP grants for an education and a good job. House Republicans got creative last week, proposing a tax amnesty program.
The numbers get scarier when considering what the economic effect of losing roughly one-fourth of the student body could have on the university and the city.
According to the Advisory Committee on Student Financial Assistance, 200,000 qualified students fail to enroll in college each year because of cost.
Grim, gloomy and dour, anyone?
“This is the issue of our day,” said SIU President Glenn Poshard last week, when he and university spokesman Dave Gross stopped at the Daily Egyptian on their campaign to “save Illinois MAP grants.”
They, and student trustee Nate Brown, are hoping to fuel a grassroots effort by students and educators, culminating at Lobby Day in Springfield Oct. 15. There, a passionate group of effected students and supporters will hopefully turn the tide in legislation before the second and last veto session.
Poshard and Gross painted a bleak picture: The financial hole Illinois is in has forced the system to stop serving the needs of people who need help the most.
The mean taxable income of MAP recipients in 2008 was just $23, 558, according to the university’s press release. The price tag for a freshman with residency is nearly $22,000 a year.
One would have to save nearly every cent of what they earned and magically remain need-free for one year to afford an SIUC education.
(Poshard did assure us that aside from the ongoing rise in the athletic fee for Saluki Way, the university’s mystifying fee rate of more than $3,000 a year should teeter out).
There’s no denying these grants provide an indelible resource to our society. Because education is a fundamental tool of success — without it, some of the world’s most fascinating minds would have never been heard — we strongly urge the state not to make getting one come down to a decision of dollars and cents for our least fortunate.
We cannot urge anyone reading this strongly enough to make an effort to save MAP grant recipients. Whether it’s through a postcard campaign, a letter to your local congressman or taking the trip up to Springfield Oct. 15, DO something.
Fact: SIUC Chancellor Sam Goldman said he would write anyone a letter to miss class who needed it.
As for a revenue alternative, one Daily Egyptian editor suggested a well-circulated, long shot idea: What about selling beer at the stadium?
Needless to say, we tried.
