I’ve been following various student loan stories, including Presidential Candidate Elizabeth Warren’s proposal for mass forgiveness and Candidate Bernie Sander’s proposal to make community colleges free to the public.
Quite frankly, I’m pissed.
But not for what you may think. I’m all for free community college, and while I believe Warren’s proposal for mass student loan forgiveness is a bit of a stretch, if she can pull it off, then all the more power to her.
What I’m pissed about are the various negative responses to these ideas. For instance, I have recently engaged in a twitter argument with a fellow who suggested students, and I quote, “go to a cheaper college”. Some others suggested not to go at all, since high schoolers can’t afford it now.
Seriously?
These are our young generation’s only options? Either go to a cheaper college or not go at all? What if one of those high schoolers dreams of becoming a doctor, who by some sheer stroke of fate, ends up saving your life? What if one of those kids dreams of becoming a police officer, who ends up saving you from a burglar breaking into your home, or heaven-forbid, worse?
What if those kids came from low income homes, or middle-class homes on the lower end of the housing spectrum?
Are you seriously willing to deny those kids their dreams? Their hopes? Their futures? Just because their parents can’t afford to pay out of pocket?
“But I’ve been paying off my student loans diligently!” Some of you may be saying. “I won’t be seeing any of that help! That’s not fair!”
Dude.
First of all, life’s not fair. No matter how many times you want to spin it, change it, manipulate it, life will never be fair.
Second, you sound like those old-timers who always give some stupid version of that “I walked through chest high snow to and from school for five miles every day when I was your age. It’s unfair that you get to have a school bus and I didn’t!”
Do you realize just how silly and ridiculous that sounds?
Times change. Technology improves, and so should education.
60 minutes did a segment on how NYU is helping medical grad-students via generous donors by paying their entire tuition. One of those students said with this help, he’d be able to become a better doctor instead of worrying how to keep his debts low.
But according to some nay-sayer’s logic, since he can’t afford to pay for med school in cash, he shouldn’t be there at all.
What if he ends up curing cancer? What if he ends ups finding a way to reverse Alzheimer’s? Do you seriously want to deny him his dream of doing some good for this world? Or anyone else, for that matter?
Yes, I have heard that higher learning is a privilege. And yes, I have been told that not all of us can, and should, go to college.
But shouldn’t that be the child’s decision, and not yours, a total stranger?
By telling college students that they’re being irresponsible by going to school, or that they shouldn’t be going to school at all, you’re basically saying they shouldn’t dream.
That’s not what we should be telling our kids. We should be encouraging the next generation to go after their dreams, their hopes, and their ambitions. We as a society should be rooting for them to find the next cure, to explore the unknown, and to reach feats we could only dream of. We shouldn’t be tearing them down or making them believe that they can’t change the world when we couldn’t.
To those who still believe that the education of the newest generation isn’t their problem, I challenge you to turn to your child. Turn to your nephew, niece, granddaughter, grandson, god-child, and all in between. Tell them to their faces, without a waiver in your voice, as their eyes sparkle with hope and unbridled passion, that they aren’t going to school to further their education. Tell them you believe college shouldn’t be accessible to all, only those who can afford it in cash. I want you to tell them they shouldn’t chase after those dreams, instead, stay in the social status level they were born into until they die.
Go ahead. I’ll wait.
.
.
.
Did you tell them?
If you did, you have a backbone made out of titanium.
You also don’t have a heart.
L.J. LaBree 