Monday, June 3, 2013
What have you been up to this summer?
CAMPUS CHIRPS BACK
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UNIVERSITY
@mattherr07
@UDK_Opinion Applied for Grad School and doing hood rat things with my friends.
@audramooncoffeee @UDK Opinion trying to navigate the construction
Summer makes campus dining hard
There are many good reasons to stay on campus for the summer. You can take mundane general education classes or work a student hourly position, both of which were my reasons for staying. But if being well fed was on your list, you had better reconsider your decision.
Student housing is one of the most reviled offices on campus, and it's easy to see why. The costs of living in one of the University's residence halls are unconscionable, pushing many students into apartments as early as freshman year.In addition to these outrageous prices, many summer housing residents will face extreme difficulty in finding places to use their meal plan.
Let's start with the most glaring flaw in the University summer housing arrangement. Mrs.E's is closed all summer due to renovations. The North College Cafe at GSP, however, remains open. This seems sane and sensible, if summer
housing residents were located in GSP. But they aren't. We were all haphazardly placed in Ellsworth. The painfully obvious bumbling of the Housing and Dining offices is only to detriment these residents.
If you are among the lucky ones with a car, this is a tedious, petty frustration. But for students who don't have a car, such as many international students, this can be devastating. Unsurprisingly, the majority of students who sign up for summer housing are international students, meaning the University has failed to accommodate to their needs. As someone who holds the value of a diverse campus with the highest regard, I find it deplorable that the University would design a summer housing plan that leaves these students in destitute. I will, therefore, waste no pleasure in smearing the name of Student Housing.
Now, it wouldn't be fair to write a scathing criticism of Student Housing without giving them a chance for rebuttal. To that end, I sent them a strongly worded email detailing these concerns. Student Housing responded with a fancy flyer listing all of the summer housing meal options. Good to know that they thought this through, except for the fact that there is a mile and a half between GSP and Ellsworth. Furthermore, three out of five of the options they listed were only available beginning June 3, again to the detriment of students who signed up for immediate
summer housing. The email also stated that Pulse and the Gridiron Room in the Burge Union were the planned alternatives to Mrs. E's, because making all of us walk up and down a hill in sweltering heat only to be greeted by a limited menu of overly priced sandwiches and smoothies is what I call "welcoming."
Perhaps the saddest aspect of this quagmire is that it even exists at all. How can something so real and essential have been neglected by the upper echelons of the administration? I beseech those in the ivory tower to recognize the crisis of student rights that is unfolding before their very own eyes. Because for us in Ellsworth, there is no means of redress or restitution. All we have are our words and empty stomachs.
Ashley is a sophomore from Topeka.
Follow him on Twitter @punchne-
kween.
EDUCATION
Two sides to the student interest rate debate
The price of college is rising exponentially, leaving many with fewer options to fund a higher education. Congress is debating this issue, the House of Representatives recently passed legislation that would skyrocket the interest rates of federal loans. This is important because federal loans for students typically have lower interest rates, making them easier to pay back. Repayment is more flexible in many ways compared to a private loan, meaning many students rely on them as a cheaper alternative to private loans.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts has argued that we should keep interest rates as low as the rates that banks pay to the Federal Reserve for short-term loans. This rate will be about 0.75 percent.
Regardless of your opinion on the federal funding of education, or
By Mikaela Wefald
mwefald@kansan.com
federal spending in general, there are many arguments to strengthen your views. The news typically covers the facts of what transpires in Congress, but what are the effects of this partisan battle?
The Republican-controlled House may be right. Perhaps it would be unwise to lower the rates on federal loans. If college supply and demand behaves like the economy, then it may be harmful to fuel a greater demand for higher education by providing a bigger incentive to go. The root cause of the problem of high tuition rests in the fact that there is a large demand to go to college because of the promise of a better job and a useful education.
However, there is a limited supply of institutions of higher learning, and it is almost impossible to build more to meet the supply. That means that in order to artificially reduce the demand, we should increase interest rates for loans, which would in turn drive down the price of tuition.
The downside to this argument is that it would also ensure that those who depend on government loans would be unable to continue a college education, or are at least worse off in the long run. In order to justify raising interest rates, you may have to argue that even if some lose out on an education, it's better for the majority of students, who will pay less.
However, there is obviously another side to the story. Senator Warren's argument is based on a short-term solution to the higher
education conundrum. With so many recent graduates bogged down in debt, the economy may suffer in the short term. This can happen in a few ways; either graduates can accept jobs they are overqualified for in order to pay back loans quickly, or they can find themselves unable to make big purchases like cars and new homes. If they can't purchase houses and cars, these industries are much worse off. Not to mention, this amount of household debt is not good by itself.
Perhaps it's a good idea to lower interest rates in the short term to reduce debt now, while colleges are growing larger to accommodate the increased demand they are facing.
Wefala is a sophomore from Manhattan.
Follow her on Twitter at @Pegasaurous-
Rex.
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