At Issue: Education...

The Tuition Game

How to have a little fun with unreasonable politicians

BY BRUCE DAVISON

OKAY FAITHFUL READERS, LET'S PLAY A little game. Instead of exposing some burning issue with this week's column, here’s a game you can play with unreasonable politicians. They insist that the government cannot afford to finance a university that makes “education so affordable for students.” You know the kind, people who seem to think that it’s alright for tuition to increase at very high rates and for funding to be cut because “students today have it so easy.”

The Tuition Game: How to play |.) Find a politician who went to U.P.E.I. (and

graduated) and who is in favour of funding cuts and sharply rising tuition (this will not be as difficult as it should be).

2.) Ask what year he or she graduated.

3.) Figure out what he or she paid in senior

year tuition, using the following:

U,P.E.I. Tuition per Course

1969-77 - $55.00 1977-78 - $68.00 1978-79 - $75.00 1979-80 - $79.00 1980-81 - $86.50 1981-82 - $97.00 1982-83 - $112.00 1983-84 - $120.00 1984-85 - $127.00 1985-86 - $135.00 1986-87 - $148.00 1987-88 - $156.00 1988-89 - $164.00 1989-90 - $172.00 1990-91 - $184.00 1991-92 - $212.00

1992-93 - $228.00 1993-94 - $249.00 And, my best guess for 1994-95 - $261.00

4.) Have him or her guess what the difference in percent is between what he or she paid and what you're now being squeezed into paying. This part is actually just for fun, as most politicians are unaware of how incredibly sharply tuition has risen. | doubt that someone who graduated in 1984, for example, and has not

made an effort to stay in touch with U.P.E.I., is going to know that tuition has risen 207.5% in only a decade.

5.) Politely (or not so politely) ask your selected politician if he or she would be interested in helping to pay the difference between the very low tuition he or she was charged and the much higher (and sharply rising) tuition you pay (or try to pay). Even if this donation wereadjusted to take into account inflation, you would still come out ahead. The next time you hear a politician trying

to justify cuts to funding, skyrocketing tuition, .

and inadequate student aid by saying that the government afford to pay so much for education, you can do a couple of things: tell him or her that students have led society by paying more and more and more each year. Then ask if he or she is up for a little game. Enjoy!

CFS gets no-voted on both coasts

More universities reject Canadian Federation of Students

(CUP) IN TWO REFERENDUMS THIS MONTH, students sent the Canadian Federation of Students a clear message: No.

At Acadia University in Wolfville, Nova Scotia, students voted ina referendum January \7-Feb. 2 to rejecta proposed CFS membership fee increase.

At Vancouver Community College's Langara campus in B.C., students rejected their membership in the CFS in a referendum held Feb. 8-10.

“The students have spoken,” said Todd Barker, president of the Acadia student council. “There is this disillusionment in the school about CFS being an Ontario-dominated Organization and the students did not want to Pay any more.”

The CFS member schools have been holding

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Again been put off, but will

referendums during the past year to approve fee increases or to decide on membership. The referendum defeat at Langara brings the number of school which have left the CFS in the last year to five.

Acadia is the second school since last February to reject a fee increase. The Acadia referendum asked students to approve a fee increase of six dollars per student from four dollars annually. About 1,150 people, or thirty-five per cent of eligible student voters, came out to vote and, when all the ballots were counted, there were 752 No votes and 692 Yes votes.

Barker says students want more value for their money before fees go up. He says there wasn’t a No or Yes campaign for the referendum, but promotion was done by the student union to get the word out about the

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delayed

referendum.

At Langara, the referendum campaign was bitterly fought with posters from both the pro-CFS and anti-CFS sides accusing the opposition of lying. <

During the referendum, 1,158 students (19.5 per cent of the 5,950 registered voters) marched to the polls and voted. By the time the ballots were counted, the No side won with a tally of 583 to 561. Laraine Bone, a candidate for the chairperson of Langara Students’ Union, says the voices telling students to vote against CFS membership were those of Langara students and that students trusted them over those of strangers from the CFS.

In the next two months, there are five more referendums on membership scheduled and seven member schools will consider fee increases.

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