Posted on 05/20/2012 7:47:29 PM PDT by artichokegrower
A mother of four who was laid off in 2008, Danielle Torno had planned on turning her life around next year with the help of a Cal State East Bay business degree.
Instead, the 36-year-old San Jose resident will be searching for another solution because of a little-noticed congressional decision to reduce or eliminate Pell Grants for hundreds of thousands of the poorest college students.
The changes take effect July 1, and students like Torno will bear the brunt of the reforms, which are expected to save $11 billion over 10 years.
Among those who will lose Pell Grants in the summer are at least 65,000 new college students without high school diplomas and 63,000 who, like Torno, have spent more than six years in college. Changes in income requirements will reduce or eliminate grants for nearly 300,000 others.
(Excerpt) Read more at santacruzsentinel.com ...
I’m sympathetic. I truly am, but here’s the truth: demand for government handouts will always, always outstrip the supply of taxpayer money. Free contraceptives, food stamps, Pell grants, free cell phones, etc. The list is endless. If it’s not permissible to cut any program that hurts someone somewhere, no program will ever be cut.
Once government starts down this path of trying to help people by redistributing wealth, there is no end to it. That doesn’t mean I don’t think people should be helped. All wealth redistributionist programs are inherently immoral in that they take from one citizen to give to another. Private charity is the only moral alternative, and it’s much more efficient, too.
I guess you’ve never heard of people studying part-time?
The woman in question is typical. Government charity, aka mandatory wealth redistribution programs, encourage irresponsible behavior. Government itself is complicit in aggravating the very problems it claims it wants to solve. Also, let's not forget the woman's own role in this. How does one get to be a single mother of four? Where's the father(s)? Is she a widow? Unlikely. She probably has a very long history of irresponsibility, and government has been there every step of the way to protect her from herself. Is it any wonder that the numbers like her keep growing?
Better Off Dead? (the movie)
I'm surprised you can get Pell grants for six years (the new rule) and before 9 years (the old rule). In NY we have TAP grants and the little money they gave me in the 90’s stopped after 8 semesters, or the equivalent of 4 years, so I graduated in 4 years!
The caption to that picture is “Danielle Torno outside of Great America Theme Park Park in Santa Clara, Calif”.
I think we now know why she is still in school after 6 years...
I went to college without a High School diploma. All of my pre-entry test scores were excellent except for math. I had a 7th grade level so I had to a remedial math course, and then 2 others to being me up to where I could take the College Algebra course.
During my time in remedial math, I was given a questionnaire regarding other education, and life experiences and so was given credit for a small amount of other classes I’d taken here and there, as well as certain life experiences. Because all of my entry test scores were so good, all combined I was awarded a GED.
I graduated college with a 3.67 GPA and donated 4 years of volunteer service to the community to say ‘thank-you’ for the opportunity to go to college. All of my college was through Pell Grants AND scholarships with a teeny amount of student loans ..under $1500.00 which I paid plus interest.
I was in my mid 30’s when I enrolled in College...on a whim, and very dissatisfied with my min. wage job. I’d raised a family already, AND had grandchildren.
Although I never did get an outstandingly profitable job, it was still the best thing I could have done for myself, and it set the example for the new up and coming generation being born in my family.
My kids ended up going to college, and now my grandkids are.
The circumstances one is in at 15-18 aren’t necessarily the circumstances you are in by middle age. Nor are you mentally the same. What didn’t work for you as a kid can change drastically when you ‘grow up’ thereby enabling you to succeed.
A high-school diploma proves little to nothing. Lots of people managed to be GIVEN a HSD when they couldn’t read, spell, or even know the difference between To, Too, & Two. I’m not talking about special ed students, either.
I’ve seen many brilliant kids fall through the cracks with poor grades due to whatever attitude an educator wanted to dump on them. Add in discouragement and you have a drop out. Let that kid grow up a bit, and the realization of the importance of training comes into perspective.
It’s sad to see this benefit cut/reduced when corporate welfare is right up there. These business are run by educated CEO’s who can’t manage money or innovation????? So much for high-school diplomas!
You can go a summer semseter on a Pell if you don’t use up your entire pell during the spring semester. Some schools will allow you to apply it toward that summer semester. That’s what I did.
I don’t know how people buy cars or furniture on school money. I was very low income and never did get more than
$300 handed to me after books,tuition, fees were paid.
That 300 paid for my lunches, and other things like notebooks, paper and pens or whatever extra supplies I needed for classes. I had no car and sure could have used one!
Who’s that guy? </ sarcasm >
Santa Cruz Sentinel reporter Matt Krurpnick comes to defence of government waste in Santa Cruz TX college system... S.C..Sentinel Nominated for Pulitzer
Better Off Dead
Apparently, this revision to the Pell grant program is causing some problems for people who home-school.
The Home School Legal Defense Association has a website, and on that website, there is a letter to Secretary Duncan about how some universities are indeed interpreting the law to mean that as of July 2012, home-schooled children are no longer eligible for Pell Grants: http://www.hslda.org/docs/news/2012/Letter_re_homeschool_eligibility_for%20FSA.pdf.
Apparently the universities are concerned about the federal requirement that home-schools be "recognized" under state law. The HSDLA's position, of course, is that the universities are wrong in their interpretation of the law.
One has to have some sympathy for the universities here.
The law does seem to me to require a recognition that I don't believe is generally available, and a university cannot blithely ignore the exact provisions of federal laws with regards to grant money: the correct standard is the most conservative interpretation of the huge morass of laws that Congress generates. Otherwise, the university is taking on a huge amount of liability if its interpretation is held to be incorrect.
As for the quote, I can only think of Blutto in the Movie Animal House, but I know that is not the exact quote or the correct movie.
In the old days 'the press' would have exposed the kind of abuse you're talking about...
“Whos that guy? </ sarcasm >”
I thought it was Robert Duvall with a horse’s tail over his shoulder, but I couldn’t find a photo with the right pose to make the point.
>>>Robert Duvall with a horses tail over his shoulder<<<
That’s funny right there, I don’t care who you are.
(except maybe “Danielle”...and probably Robert Duvall!...lol)
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