Posted on 03/14/2015 5:18:15 AM PDT by maggief
President Obama on Saturday urged Americans to sign his new “Student Aid Bill of Rights” and collectively work towards reducing the cost of higher education.
“In an economy increasingly built on innovation, the most important skill you can sell is your knowledge,” Obama said in his weekly address Saturday. “That’s why higher education is, more than ever, the surest ticket to the middle class.”
“But just when it’s never been more important, it’s also never been more expensive,” he added. “The average undergrad who borrows to pay for college ends up graduating with about $28,000 in student loan debt.”
The president touted several of his initiatives aimed at lowering that price tag. He cited expanding tax credits, giving more Pell Grants, reforming student loan programs and pushing for free community college as examples of progress. Despite these, Obama said, such measures were not enough.
“But all of us — elected officials, universities, business leaders — everybody needs to do more to bring down college costs,” he said. “Which is why this week, I unveiled another way that we can help more Americans afford college. It doesn’t involve any new spending or bureaucracy. It’s a simple declaration of values — what I call a ‘Student Aid Bill of Rights.’ ”
Obama said the document lists four principles. It starts by saying every student deserves access to a “quality, affordable education.”
From there, it states students who take out loans should have access to “resources to pay for college” and an “affordable repayment plan.”
Finally, it said borrowers deserve “quality customer service,” “reliable information” and “fair treatment” during the repayment process.
The president asked Americans to sign his new declaration and then share it with as many friends, family members and students as possible.
“In America, a higher education cannot be a privilege reserved for only the few,” Obama said. “It has to be available to everybody who’s willing to work for it.”
The “Student Aid Bill of Rights” is available at WhiteHouse.gov/CollegeOpportunity.
Funny. The middle class was mostly built by tradesmen and makers who didn’t have much schooling beyond high school.
Yeah....and if you’re a magic come-from-nowhere-minority with no documented (or dubious) provenance, it gets even better. Heck, you don’t even really have to graduate, or prove you did with transcripts. Your word is your bond. /s
Surest method...get married before you have kids. Have parents who did the same.
And those opportunities have been pretty much gutted by offshoring much of our manufacturing.
NOTHING I see here will do a single thing but INCREASE costs of “higher” education. Only an economic moron or a Democrat (is there a difference?) would think it possible to bring the cost of a good down by throwing more money at it.
My college degree from Syracuse in 1989 did little to lift me into the middle class.
However, my (CDL)Commercial Driver License from 1996 opened plenty of doors I never knew existed that lifted me into the middle class.
He’s so far out of touch with reality it’s like he’s from another planet. With many graduates facing a non-existent job market, foreign workers being brought in h1b visas out competing Americans on cost if not quality, a flood of illegals taking all lower tier jobs who are soon to be granted amnesty it amounts to insanity to take on a 4 year commitment with no guaranty of ROI for one’s best years of their youth.
Better to take the 100k and sink it into community business or accounting classes and start a business with the remainder with a foothold here and in a rising foreign nation. Pretty much anywhere else.
Just giving college degrees to people who have not earned them and are in no way improved by the four years they’ve spent does not make them employable. It makes them indebted, angry and resentful.
Pipefitter, electrician,boilermaker, millrite helpers make close to $20 an hour straight out of high school. Journeyman $30-35 an hour non union.
>>Funny. The middle class was mostly built by tradesmen and makers who didn’t have much schooling beyond high school.
True! College should be a ticket to the high end of the middle class and above. But instead of that, it has become a measure of the extent to which an applicant will follow instructions without question. I started out as an electrician and didn’t go to college until decades later. Nothing about it was hard, but the common thread throughout the whole education process was “follow these assignment instructions to the letter, or points will be deducted”. I feel sorry for people who attend college without first experiencing life as a productive adult. Now I understand why they graduate as sheep that have been indoctrinated (instead of being taught) by their professors. The professor teaches “Question Authority”, but you are NEVER to question her authority!
My advice - learn a trade, serve a few years in the military, and if you still want to go to college at least now you have some GI Bill bucks to help you along, and you'll have a level of maturity so as not to waste your education being a manboy fratchild, otherwise, get your journeyman's cert and quietly become the millionaire next door as you build your heating and plumbing business.
Getting a job and working hard at it is the surest way to the middle class.
Starting a small business and working night and day to succeed is the surest way to the upper class.
But if you want to get really rich, become a Democrat politician.
Even more students who don't belong in college being there will lower the standards, increase the unemployment level for college grads and force many potential innovators into classes where their imaginations are destroyed.
The answer isn't more college. It's more opportunity and more self-responsibility.
Obamadiploma. Let others pay for your education.
Same as Obamacare, Obamaphone and every other scheme this snake oil salesman has pushed on us.
They only serve to add to the burden of the middle class and weaken it, not help. Just what's going to happen when the middle class is destroyed and there's no more money coming in to pay for all these schemes?
...for college professors.
Kind of like giving high school diplomas to people who are illiterate and innumerate.
My Dad worked in a blue collar job. He did graduate from high school, but most of his contemporaries didn’t. Times were tough, particularly during the Great Depression. Once a kid reached his teen years, he had enough schooling. Time to go out, get a job and support the family.
That was 50 years ago, Mr. President. Times have changed and everyone under 30 knows it.
John Ratzenberger is correct about the fact that we need to go back to teaching shop class in school. Even if it doesn’t lead you down a career path you’ll be able to put up a wall that doesn’t fall down.
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