By Julia Yetter And Alexandra Sailor
University of Louisville students gathered at the state capitol in Frankfort on Wednesday to rally their support for higher education funding.
After weeks of promoting with flyers, e-mails and on-campus lawn signs, students and U of L’s Student Government Association took the hour and a half journey to Frankfort to make their voices heard.
Many students expressed their concern over the budget proposal made by Gov. Steve Beshear last month, which includes a 12 percent cut to higher education funding. Many fear this could force tuition beyond the means of some students.
“I’m here on a scholarship but budget cuts would make it hard for students like me to get scholarships for the future.” said Sara Noori, a sophomore art major. “KEES money pays for my art supplies and books, without it I would really struggle.”
U of L students waved signs and shouted along with college students from all over the state, with some professing how big of an issue these budget cuts should be to most Kentucky students.
“It really affects the average middle class student,” said Anna Ramsay, a finance major. “It’s not fair to mandate U of L a research university and then to place the burden of funding on students,” said Ramsay.
Joshua McCollum said it was important for him to be at the rally because he is an average student.
“I’m not poor enough to get a large amount of financial aid and I’m not rich enough to pay the price of education myself,” said McCollum, a liberal studies major.
Students attending the rally were given free transportation, lunch and a t-shirt as well as an exemption from class that day.
According to Kate Brueggemann, the Executive Vice-President of the Student Government Association, letters were written to faculty to let them know students may miss school and asked for support from them. SGA also placed approximately 200 yard signs throughout campus in order to notify students.
“We needed to come out in masses to back up what we say to legislators through SGA,” said Brueggemann, a senior political science major.
Yet, even with the university wide absence exemption, rally participation wasn’t as high as other universities participating.
“My professor told us that even though it would be exempt we wouldn’t be allowed to make up the work that we missed,” said McCollum “I think that’s why a lot of students didn’t show up.”
Those students who did attend the rally shared one common emotion: anger towards state legislation.
“Legislators obviously don’t care about students,” said Karen Claough, a communication and psychology major. “If we don’t have funding for our education what is that going to do to the state in ten years?”
“Investing in higher education is detrimental to the success of the commonwealth,” said Kirk Laughlin, a political science and history major.
House Democrat Mary Lou Marzian, who opposes cuts to higher education, offered a group of students some insight regarding Frankfort politics.
“The funding cuts are devastating but it’s up to you and U of L’s faculty to make noise and get the attention of the policy members,” Marzian said. “We’ve lost three billion dollars in Kentucky to the war in Iraq and what legislators are doing is passing that tax on. It’s simply not acceptable.”
Photos from the rally can be viewed at www.louisvillecardinal.com.
