The Chicago Tribune reports that Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan helped to get nearly 30 students admitted to the University of Illinois system after their family members contributed heavily to his campaigns.
After Chicago Tribune and Daily Illini investigations last year found that politically connected students were being admitted when they shouldn’t be, a number of University officials resigned. Now, a subsequent investigation by the Tribune finds that the powerful Illinois Speaker helped 28 students admitted to the University, only five of whom were from his district. In total, the families of those students contributed $115,200 to the Speaker’s campaigns.
Twenty higher education organizations have come out in opposition to an Obama Administration proposal to condition education tax credits on community service.
While the groups have supported both additional aid and tax credits for higher education and efforts to increase community service, they argue that linking the two will create more harm than good. Specifically, they argue that it would be hard for low-income and older students to complete community service in addition to work and family commitments, that schools don’t have an infrastructure to administer such a program and that it would advantage wealthy students that aren’t dependent on tax credits.
The departments of Education and Treasury are currently studying the idea which Obama first proposed during his campaign.
One year in, the University of Alaska-Fairbanks is struggling to spend a new green fee effectively. As more and more campuses add fees for energy conservation, renewable energy and other environmental sustainability projects, Alaska’s experience highlights key questions schools will need to answer.
Last year, students approved a $20 per semester fee to fund conservation and renewable energy. The University pledged to match the fee resulting in roughly $500,000 per year to fund sustainability projects.
The fee that was approved, however, was intentionally vague and the total budget will likely be larger than the cost of the projects discussed during the fee vote. Now, administrators and student leaders are trying to decide how to spend the money.
Spending plans for the green fee will be split between a campus sustainability office and a student board called RISE (review of infrastructure, sustainability and energy). The campus sustainability office will have 14 part time student staff focused on specific green projects. That effort, however, will still leave a large amount of money unspent, which the RISE board will help to allocate.
Even those boards, however, are still struggling to determine the long-term plans for the fee revenue. As a consequence, administrators are now looking to roll over revenue until the campus has a long-term plan.
States across the country are grappling with declining state revenues and corresponding declines in appropriations to higher education. Now, new data shows that this round of cuts may take longer to restore and produce major changes in the makeup of the faculty.
A study released this week by the American Educational Research Association (AERA) shows that while state higher education funding tends to be cyclical, this round of budget cuts will take longer to restore than earlier ones.
While in the 1980’s, 76 percent of funding cuts to higher education were restored within five years, now only 40 percent are. The data also revealed that states imposing large tuition increases to cope with funding cuts took longer to recover since legislators see that those institutions are able to cover their operating budget in other ways.
Across the country, many states felt they had no choice but to pass dramatic increases to tuition over the past two years. Just this week, the University of Virginia board approved a 9.9 percent tuition hike for in-state students and the Virginia Commonwealth University board approved a 24 percent tuition hike.
Cuts are changing more than just the cost of education as more states freeze hiring and move away from tenure track positions. At the University of Minnesota, the number of non-tenure track faculty members increased by 15 percent since 2003 and the number of tenure-track faculty decreased by 20 percent.
Faculty members granted tenure are essentially granted a career-long contract to teach and research at the University. This status allows them to comfortably take on long-term research projects and gives them more freedom to pursue controversial issues in their research and teaching. However, tenure positions provide a university with less budget flexibility since they tend to cost more and are difficult to remove.
Officials at the University of Minnesota worry that the trend of eliminating tenure-track positions will ultimately make the University less competitive and less attractive to students.
Tenured faculty members tend to take on more of the long-term research projects that attract large grants and prestige and have more teaching experience. Because they tend to spend their careers at that campus, tenured faculty are also in a better position to develop new programs and courses.
While the percentage of Arkansas students that graduate in a reasonable time-frame isn’t decreasing, it remains far below other Southeastern states.
A recent report by the state Department of Higher Education shows that only 38 percent of students at Arkansas’s public universities graduate within six years. At community colleges, only 17 percent of students earn an associate’s degree within two years. Across the region, where the average graduation rate is 53 percent, these figures put Arkansas dead last.
Arkansas higher education officials believe their low rates have more to do with external factors—poverty and poor education heading into college—than what happens once students enter a college or university. Last year, 54 percent of new students needed to take remedial classes.
To combat the problem, the state added a new core curriculum for high schools called Smart Core and started a lottery funded scholarship this year.
For-profit colleges, which get most of their revenue through federal grant and loan funds, are increasingly recruiting homeless students to enroll and take on debt to finance their education.
Over the past decade, grant aid and federal loans awarded to students at for-profit colleges increased from $4.6 billion to 26.5 billion. At the same time, these loan and grant programs have become the dominant part of the operating budget for these schools. Federal funds now comprise 86% of the revenue for the University of Phoenix and 87% of the revenue for the Drake College of Business.
For schools looking to increase enrollment and revenue, low income and homeless students are ideal since they qualify for the most federal grants and loans. College recruiters, whether out of their own ingenuity or direction from their supervisors, are increasingly recruiting students from shelters and other relief agencies.
While many public community college students are also lower income, they also pay less in tuition and graduate with less debt than students at for-profit institutions. Annual tuition at many for-profit schools is between $10,000 and $20,000 and is expected to keep rising. Drake College of Business, for example, increased its tuition by $11,700 this year.
While most of the country is focused on the impact of Arizona’s new immigration law to immigrant and minority communities, a research association is now also raising alarm bells about the impact the law could have on academic research.
The American Educational Research Association (AERA) passed a resolution opposing the recent Arizona immigration law during their conference over the weekend. Members expressed concern that the new law would make it difficult for many academic professionals to travel in the state and would make research studies on immigrant and Latino communities difficult.
As Kris Gutiérez, the president-elect of the organization put it, “doing this work requires the trust and respect of these communities. Researchers are also held suspect in these communities. You layer onto it the fear of being profiled and deported.”
Gutiérez also noted that many of the researchers were frustrated that the legislative efforts to stop illegal immigration in Arizona and elsewhere seem to ignore the findings of many of their studies.
While study after study shows that student debt is increasing, the College Board recently reported that parents of college students are also taking on alarming levels of debt—up to $71,000 in some cases.
The study, conducted by the College Board, found that when students are taking on high debt, their parents tend to as well. For students with high debt levels, $30,500 or more, 42 percent of their parents had federal PLUS loans of approximately the same amount. Parents that earn at least $100,000 per year now have an average loan burden of $41,000.
The same study found that college costs are also skyrocketing. The overall cost of college has increased nearly 500 percent since 1980.
After a year where California students saw some of the highest fee increases in the nation, legislators are proposing improvements to the Cal Grant program and Governor Schwarzenegger is promising more money for higher education.
While this year’s cuts and fee increases were higher than usual, the past five years have not been kind to students’ budgets in California. Over that period, fees for University of California students have increased by 61 percent while fees for California State University students have increased by 68 percent.
On Tuesday, Governor Schwarzenegger promised to veto the state budget if it did not include an increase in funding for higher education. His budget proposal included a $224 increase in spending from the general fund for higher education.
Despite Schwarzenegger’s statement, the percentage of general fund spending on higher education spending has declined since he took office, reaching an all-time low in 2006. Schwarzenegger also proposed eliminating the state’s financial aid program, the Cal Grant, in July of 2009 to fill the state’s budget hole.
The Governor’s statement about the budget comes on the heels of Assembly Bill 2447, which would improve the Cal Grant program, passing a key committee vote. The bill would tie financial aid to the rate of inflation and to fee increases. It would also protect the program from cuts by making it part of the “locked budget.”
Cal Grants currently serve 22,500 students statewide.
A coalition of student organizations held a flash-mob and placed 1,100 backpacks around the University of Minnesota campus to raise awareness about student suicide last week.
The 1,100 backpacks represent the number of students who commit suicide each year. Suicide is the third highest cause of death among people between the ages of 15 and 24.
The student groups held the events to raise awareness of student mental health problems and to encourage more people to speak up about the problems students experience on campus.
More from the Minnesota Daily at the University of Minnesota
A report released last week shows that more than half of graduates from for-profit colleges had more than $30,500 in college loan debt. The same report, released by the College Board Advocacy and Policy Center, showed that black graduates are most likely to have high debt levels.
Overall, the report found that two thirds of bachelor’s degree recipients graduated with some debt while nearly 17 percent graduated with very high debt levels--$30,500 or more.
For black graduates, 27 percent graduated with high debt levels and only 19 percent graduated without any debt.
Students graduating from for-profit colleges were the most likely to graduate with debt as well as the most likely to graduate with high levels of debt. While 38 percent of the students at public, four-year institutions were debt free, only 4 percent of students from for-profit schools were. Students at for-profit institutions were also four times more likely to have at least $30,500 in debt than their peers at public four-year colleges.
As many legislatures finalize their budgets for the coming fiscal year, schools are again seeing big cuts and students are again faced with rising tuition and fees.
In Oklahoma, the state’s universities are facing a 10 percent cut. The state’s higher education chancellor, Glen Johnson, says this size of a cut will force universities to eliminate hundreds of faculty positions, eliminate 400 classes and cut financial aid.
While the situation is less bleak in Maryland, students are now facing the first tuition increase in five years. Last week, the Board of Regents for the University of Maryland system voted to increase tuition for undergraduates by 3 percent while hiking tuition for graduate students by 6.2 percent.
Finally, in Nevada, the Board of Regents voted to increase tuition by 9.5 percent at community colleges and by 9.8 percent at the University of Nevada campuses. Over the past five years, tuition for in-state students has increased by roughly 40 percent.
The student government at the Townson University adopted a “green fund” last week to support student-initiated sustainability projects. The fund will be created from a $2 SGA fee increase approved two weeks ago.
Any student will be able to propose a project, from bike rental programs to LED lighting.
While a number of campuses around the country have green fees or sustainability funds, Townson is hoping to lead the way for the University of Maryland system. Elliot Glotfelty, the student that initiated the SGA resolution, also wanted to ensure students had more of a say in greening the campus.
“I feel like the administrators are throwing around a lot of money but they’re not actually getting student opinions on it, and if we can get student opinions on what money should be allocated towards something like green initiatives, I think it’d be a great opportunity for the SGA,” Glotfelty told The Towerlight.
Senators in Colorado are proposing major changes in the tuition and financial policies for the state’s institutions of higher education. After years of budget cuts, the changes would give the schools more flexibility in setting tuition levels and managing their finances. In return, the proposal would increase reporting requirements and force the schools to have a plan to maintain affordability.
If passed, the bill would remove a cap on tuition increases and let the colleges’ boards set tuition rates. Schools would, however, only be able to increase rates by more than 9 percent per year if it was necessary to cover significant decreases in state support. In return for that flexibility, schools would have to submit five-year financial projections, plans for preserving accessibility and affordability for low and middle-income students and five-year plans to improve in areas like quality of instruction and student success.
The bills would also allow schools to decide how many non-residents to admit, but would require that they admit all qualified Colorado applicants.
Police officers and the Virginia Commonwealth’s Attorney seized hundreds of photos from The Breeze’s offices this week, following a spring party that turned into a riot. The officers threatened that they’d confiscate all of the equipment and documents from the paper’s office before the student editors agreed to turn the photos over.
The police were investigating a party turned riot in a student heavy neighborhood near the James Madison University campus in Harrisonburg.
After the raid, the student editors sought legal counsel. The photos are now temporarily sealed until the paper and Commonwealth attorney can come to an agreement. Multiple student and area papers have also weighed in, arguing that the First Amendment and Privacy Protection Act should allow The Breeze to avoid turning over the photos.
Following the cancellation of a speech from Prof. William Ayers at the University of Wyoming, students and faculty members are planning a rally for free speech. Ayers, a professor at the University of Illinois-Chicago, became a lightning rod for controversy during the 2008 election because of his association with President Obama and his past involvement with the Weather Underground.
While Ayers has filed suit against the University, there has been little response from students or faculty members until now. Sociology professor Dr. David Ashley, believes many of the faculty members are afraid to stand up for free speech and academic freedom.
“I think many of the faculty are cowed and fearful. There’s not much they can do to me, but I certainly wouldn’t be speaking out if I weren’t tenured,” Ashley told the Laramie Boomerang.
This is the second time that Ayers has been invited to campus, only to have his speaking engagement canceled.
This week, the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments in a case that could have repercussions for student organizations on most college and university campuses. The case, Christian Legal Society v. Martinez, pits a student group against the University of California Hastings College of Law over the college’s non-discrimination policy.
Christian Legal Society (CLS) is a national organization with chapters at multiple law schools. The organization requires that members sign a statement of faith and avoid engaging in sex outside of a heterosexual marriage.
That statement of faith often comes in conflict with university policies requiring that student organizations not discriminate in their membership in order to be recognized by the school or receive funding through student activity fees.
Attorneys for Hastings argue that the group is seeking special treatment and that if an organization receives school funds it should be required to allow all students to fully participate. Attorneys for CLS argue that student organizations have a right to associate with like-minded students and that funding and school recognition cannot be contingent on giving up First Amendment rights.
The Court is expected to issue a decision by the end of the summer.
Student newspapers in Virginia can no longer print advertisements for alcoholic beverages, following a Friday district court ruling.
According to the ruling, campus publications are not exempt from a Virginia Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC) rule prohibiting them from printing any ad referencing beer, wine or mixed beverages. The only exception to the ban is for advertisements "in reference to a dining establishment." The rule also bans specific mentions of drink specials or happy hours.
The majority opinion stated that “though the correlation between advertising and demand alone is insufficient to justify advertising bans in every situation ... here it is strengthened because 'college student publications' primarily target college students and play an inimitable role on campus.”
The case began in 2006, when the Collegiate Times at Virginia Tech University and the Cavalier Daily at the University of Virginia sued to overturn the ruling, arguing that it violated the First Amendment. The two papers also claimed that the majority of their readership was of legal drinking age.
After the court initially ruled in favor of the publications, the ABC appealed the decision.
The dissenting opinion claimed “there is no evidence that these newspapers are 'targeted at students under twenty-one" and that “In free speech cases, it is dangerous and unwise to sustain broad regulations for narrow reasons.”
The publications have two weeks to petition for a hearing before the full court of appeals.
University of Georgia students expressed their frustrations regarding tailgating bans on an historic part of campus, arguing that they should be included in such decision-making.
University alumnus, Danny Brown, created a Facebook group titled “Michael Adams Extravaganza (Myers Quad),” as a forum for the 1,400 fans of the group to protest the restrictions. Brown also encouraged fans to bring banned items such as tents, kegs, televisions, and grills to areas on North Campus to Myers Quad.
The tailgating restrictions were instated in response to problems with waste and damage to the surrounding environment, but Brown argues that the administration could have found others solutions to the trash problem.
“I just feel like the administration needs to be a little more understanding that there will be trash, and that there are some alternatives they could have considered other than just going ahead and pretty much banning tailgating altogether on North Campus,” Brown said.
“With the amount of money that alumni and students spend on game day, I think that the Athletic Association and the administration have plenty of funds to institute better trash pickup on North Campus,” he added.
He also said that North Campus is one of the prettiest and historic places on the university grounds, and people have been tailgating there for years to enjoy that atmosphere.
However, Dexter Adams, director of the grounds for Physical Plant, insisted that the restrictions are necessary.
“It goes beyond just picking up the trash,” Adams said. “We were seeing actual physical damage to the grounds and damage that we couldn’t fix, like tree loss.”
Students have fought to be represented during further tailgating decision-making.
“Our biggest problem is that there was no student voice in the making of the decision,” says Josh Delaney, president-elect for the Student Government Association. “We want every decision to be justified to students.”
Danely says that although students did not have representation in the first meeting, the administration has agreed to allow a student representative on the panel that reviews the restrictions.
Delaney also expressed concern about the push from Brown and others to move tailgaters to areas such as the Myers Quad, a student residential area.
“Since people won’t be able to tailgate like they used to on North Campus, they will move to residential areas like the Myers Quad,” Delaney said. “We really don’t want those students in residential areas to be facing trash problems.”
Adams expects that students will find other places to tailgate, but said that at least the bans are protecting the “historic grounds of the oldest university in the country.” He added that relieving pressure from those grounds will enable fans to enjoy North Campus as a more park-like area.
Still, students remain steadfast in having their voices heard.
“I just want the administration to fully realize that game day is a tradition,” Delaney said. “It’s not just an alum thing, it’s a student thing and students want to be included. This is something that affects the students heavily, and we need to consult the people who live on this campus.”
Three of the University of Denver’s top student government leaders will receive roughly $1,500 annually each after a 15-3 vote last Tuesday. Not all student government members were pleased with the outcome of the vote that also stopped student government funding for student media. Several senators believed funds could be allocated to other student initiatives.
“I was discouraged and confused to see a proposal for our executive scholarship at the expense of greater student initiatives,” said student senator and junior Dillon Doyle. “I think $4,500 could fund fairly large student organizations. I think it could fund quite a few, a handful. I think $4,500 could bring hundreds more students on beginner Alpine Club trips. While I’m not trying to diminish the work the USG Executive Branch seeks to accomplish, I’m here to say that this is wrong and a disservice to our constituents.”
Also part of the discussion Tuesday was the elimination of funding from student fees for the student media outlets. Student media organizations, including the Clarion, will no longer receive funding that has historically ranged from $25,000 to $50,000. Money will now come from special appropriations through a contingency fund operated by Student Life.
“This will insure a free and independent media that is not subject to the views of the university, of the Undergraduate Student Government or of certain elected positions on campus,” said Antoine Perretta, student body president. “It’ll ensure SMB [Student Media Board] has it’s own autonomy to function free from the restraints we may or may not try to put on [campus media].”
Syracuse University students are petitioning the college to remove this year's commencement ceremony speaker, JPMorgan Chase & Co. Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon.
More than 1000 students, alumni and parents have signed an online petition posted by the student group Take Back 2010 Syracuse University Commencement--a number representing over one-fifth of SU's senior class. According to the petition, students are "against using the 2010 commencement to restore the public image of the banking industry and validate the anti-environmental and anti-humanitarian interests of JP Morgan Chase." Students also planned to throw a protest dance party April 14 on the Quad, according to the Daily Orange, the school's student newspaper.
The students were careful to note that they were protesting the financial industry rather than trying to personally attack Dimon.
"A lot of members of my graduating class aren't going to be able to afford to graduate because of the industry Mr. Dimon represents," said Amelia Pernell, a senior at Syracuse's Newhouse School of Public Communications and one of the authors of the petition.
Dimon's name was on a list of candidate speakers compiled by students, and he was chosen because of his rare, extensive experience with a "major global challenge," said University Chancellor Nancy Cantor.
The University won't rescind Dimon's invitation, said Kevin Quinn, the University's senior vice president for public affairs.
"We're aware of the student concerns, but Jamie Dimon is our commencement speaker," he said.
The protest group is planning for more direct action to raise campus and national awareness of their concerns. Their ideas include finding a different speaker who would not be as polarizing, and holding a vigil in which students walk toward the administration building, snapping wooden pencils and dropping them on the ground.
“We want to have a vigil for everyone who had to drop out and everyone across America who is suffering from what JPMorgan represents,” said petition co-writer Adrienne Garcia.
“When we feel wronged," said group member and senior journalism and geography major Ashley Owen, "we have the idea that we can raise up.”
Prosecutors have launched a criminal investigation into the beating of a University of Maryland student by three police officers last month after a video showed that the student was unarmed and was not menacing.
The video shows the student, John J. McKenna, celebrating a basketball ball game victory in the streets before being pushed by three police officers and beat repeatedly with a baton. The 21-year-old had a concussion and needed eight staples to a wound on his head.
The officers now face both an internal affairs and a criminal investigation as does the county officer involved in filing the charging documents.
"The video shows the charging documents were nothing more than a cover, a fairy tale they made up to cover for the officers' misconduct," said the student’s lawyer, Christopher A. Griffiths. "The video shows gratuitous violence against a defenseless individual."
The charging documents said McKenna and co-defendant Benjamin C. Donat attacked the officers on horseback before being beaten. The documents also stated that the two students were injured by the horses, with no mention of the officers’ participation. The video shows no evidence of either charge. The charges against Donat have also been dropped.
So far, one of the three officers has been suspended during the investigation and the two others will receive the same action once they are identified, said Prince George’s County Police Chief Roberto L. Hylton. Because all of the officers are wearing riot gear, it is hard to identify them based on appearances.
"I'm outraged and disappointed after viewing the video," Hylton said. "That's not the type of professional conduct we promote. Any employee who uses excessive force will be held accountable."
When California State University-Stanislaus invited Gov. Sarah Palin to speak at their 50th anniversary gala dinner, whistle-blowers began to question how much the non-profit foundation hosting the benefit was paying the former Alaska governor and whether the foundation was benefiting financially.
According to the Los Angeles Times, the foundation refused to divulge Palin’s fee, raising concerns about how private non-profit foundations associated with fundraising efforts for public universities use their money. Such foundations are often involved in raising money for scholarships, student organizations and other university programs. However, because they are private organizations, they are not subject to the same financial transparency laws that regulate public universities.
Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco) is trying to change that by expanding California’s public record laws so that foundations associated with public universities would have to reveal the names of donors who gave more than $500.
"The larger issue is that I believe the state universities have been shifting some of their state responsibilities over to the foundations for the sole purpose of hiding transactions involving millions of dollars from the public," said Yee in an interview with the Los Angeles Times.
More than 90 foundations and auxiliary services control $1.34 billion of the 34-campus California State University system’s $6.7 billion budget, while 10 foundations control $4 billion of the 10-campus University of California system’s budget, according to the Los Angeles Times.
"These are nonprofit, charitable enterprises but they are also business enterprises. That's all the more significant in an environment of severely rationed resources," said Terry Francke the general council for a non-profit group that promotes government transparency, Californians Aware.
Gov. Arnold Schwartzenegger vetoed a bill proposed by Yee last year that would have required non-profits to disclose both their donor list and how the organizations used donor funds.
Schwartzenegger and some university officials fear that increasing transparency will significantly decrease the amount of donations the California public university system would receive.
A towing company in Michigan sued a Western Michigan University student for $750,000, claiming that his Facebook group has cost the company that much money in business.
Joseph Bird, the owner of T&J Towing, claims in the suit that WMU junior Justin Kurtz is using the group in a “crusade to post verbal and written claims and misuse of the Internet with allegations that are untrue and/or dishonest and without merit.”
Kurtz started the group because he was upset about his own car being towed, but many of the comments on the group’s page indicate that many students believe the companies’ practices are unfair. By April 13th, Kurtz’s group “Kalamazoo Residents against T&J Towing” had about 4,200 members.
Despite the size of the lawsuit, Kurtz seemed relatively unfazed. “It was $750,000 for slander and defamation of character—lost income, I guess,” he told Channel 8 Wood TV. “It’s kind of shocking. It’s a little comical for how much he’s suing me.”
Comments on Kurtz’s group range from legal advice to well-wishing to anecdotal supporting evidence. In a message echoed by many others, one recent poster wrote, “they towed my vehicle when i was legally parked, in my apartment lot, with a sticker for the apartment. i walked into my friends apt, grabbed my backpack, said goodbye, went outside and it was gone (sic). …oh, and for the record, bring exactly $120 or whatever it is, because they won’t give you change.”
Local Newschannel 3 interviewed two former employees of T&J, both of whom corroborated the complaints being brought against the company. One said that he was asked to do things he felt were wrong “about 80 percent of the time.” The two employees declined to be identified, saying that if Bird found out who they were he would “likely have us messed with.”
The former employees were unable to give proof of their claims, and Bird said that, even though he didn’t know their identities, they were simply disgruntled employees badmouthing his business.
Regardless, with time and added publicity, Kurtz will likely continue to accumulate members to his group—“for every resident who was legitimately parked where they are supposed to be but were still towed by this dishonest company”—as the case moves toward judicial resolution.
A Minnesota Daily housing survey reports that 40% of properties surrounding the University of Minnesota campus are “over-occupied.” The residents, who are overwhelmingly students, have been violating a city ordinance regulating the number of occupants an apartment can have in order to reduce the cost of rent.
When the city of Minneapolis came knocking, Taryn and her six roommates (students at UMN) followed their landlord’s directions carefully: don’t let them in.
Taryn and her roommates’ home in the Southeast Como neighborhood has six bedrooms, but the city only allows for three unrelated people to reside there.
When city officials made an appointment to inspect their apartment, the landlord hid half the residents’ furniture and belongings in a moving truck. Once clear of the over-occupancy inspection, the three other residents moved back in.
In a survey of 77 houses in Southeast Como, 31 were over-occupied. In another student heavy neighborhood, Marcy-Holmes, nine of the 22 houses were over-occupied. The city has zoned these homes for just three occupants, even though the Minneapolis property information database states that most of them have more than three bedrooms.
Neal, another student, occupies one such home in Marcy-Holmes. If Neal and his roommates abided by the three occupant city limit, rent and utilities would have amounted to over $700 per person each month. Neal said that with that kind of rent, they wouldn’t have signed the lease.
Tim Harmsen, owner of Dinkytown Rentals, sympathizes with the students.
“If you’re a college student and you’ve got five bedrooms in a house, it’s unrealistic for those bedrooms not to be occupied,” he says.
Many landlords share Harmsen’s sentiment. Of 31 over-occupied homes in Southeast Como, landlords knew that more than 84% were over-occupied.
Robert Clarksen, a city planner in the Minneapolis Zoning Administration and Enforcement department says that he and his colleagues are aware of high rates of over-occupancy near the university.
Still, the City of Minneapolis Housing Inspections Services reports that only 50 cases of unlawful occupancy have been filed since Jan. 2000.
Clarkson adds that until the mid-1980s, much of Marcy-Holmes allowed for high-density housing for students.
However, the neighborhood’s long-term residents found the high-density homes to be undesirable. They pressured the city into changing the zoning laws and pushing the high-density student housing to the outskirts of the city.
“There’s an interesting dichotomy that goes in [the University] area that doesn’t happen elsewhere in the city, with the temporary nature of the students contrasted with the long-term property owners that are there,” Clarksen said.
Various neighborhood organizations, such as the Marcy Holmes Neighborhood Association (MHNA) and the Southeast Como Improvement Association (SECIA) argue that allowing more residents per house can create parking, waste and safety problems.
City Council member Diane Hofste (who represents Marcy-Holmes) argues that the current zoning laws are not unjust.
“It’s not directed at students,” she said. “It’s directed at making a safe environment for people and actually intended to limit some of the abuses of cramming many people into a household.”
Though students represent roughly 80% of the renters in these communities, they are largely absent at the polls. In 2009, student voter turnout was below 10% in the City Council election.
“If you don’t vote, leadership doesn’t recognize you as a constituent,” says Wells, executive director UNIA.
Wells and Harmsen agree that landlords, long-term residents, and students must come together and compromise.
However, SECIA neighborhood coordinator James De Sota says that long-term residents of Southeast Como are resistant to any discussion.
“I don’t know if anyone would really want to come to the table and look at any kind of compromise,” says De Sota.
More from the Minnesota Daily at the University of Minnesota
Immigration reform supporters from Whitman University joined thousands of protestors rallying last Saturday in Seattle to put pressure on Congress to update and expand the nation's immigration laws.
The Washington Immigration Reform Coalition, an organization that includes more than 50 immigrants’ rights groups, labor unions, faith-based organizations and community groups, coordinated the rally according to the Whitman Pioneer.
While some of the 35 Whitman students who joined the rally came because of their own personal experiences with U.S. immigration policy, others simply attended to show support for the cause.
“It doesn’t help anyone to have people living in the shadows, in fear. It’s not just about immigrants’ rights; it’s about everyone’s rights,” said Whitman junior Lissa Erickson, in an interview with the Whitman Pioneer.
“There is a need to solve [immigration], and in order to solve it, there has to be a push from ordinary Americans,” said sophomore Yonas Fikak.
Like many pro-reform college students around the country, Fikak said that he supported the DREAM Act, a bill that if passed, would allow students who are currently in the country illegally to gain citizenship and become eligible for financial aid.
Fikak said that when he applied to college he had friends who struggled to get financial assistance because they were undocumented immigrants.
"They were going through problems applying for scholarships," he said. "They were doing a lot more work than I was doing."
In addition to the DREAM Act, one of the other main pieces of immigration legislation currently under review by Congress is the Comprehensive Immigration Reform for America’s Security and Prosperity Act (CIR-ASAP).
Senators Charles Schumer (D-NY) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) have also proposed that all American workers should be issued biometric identification cards to discourage the hiring of illegal immigrants.
According to OneAmerica, one of the groups participating in the rally, Washington was the first state to have both of its Senators write a letter to President Obama demanding action on immigration reform this year.
U.S. Rep. Jim McDermott, D-Seattle, was well-received at the rally when he opened his remarks with, "Good afternoon, fellow immigrants." He went on to say, "Our current immigration system places more emphasis on filling out forms properly than on compassion and common sense."
College students, facing a national unemployment rate is 10.4 percent, are now often willing to go without pay in return for career experience—even when filling jobs salaried staffers used to hold.
As companies try to cut costs they’re increasingly relying on unpaid internships. Nearly 60 percent of University of Southern California students, for example, hold an internship at some point during their college tenure.
“The feedback we are getting from employers is that having work experience is more important than grade-point average,” said USC Career Planning & Placement Center Executive Director Eileen Kohan.
However, unpaid internships are not as viable for students already struggling to afford college. As unpaid internships become more commonplace, some--most prominently the New York Times are questioning whether or not companies are taking advantage of their interns.
Kerry Fields, a professor at the Marshall School of Business and an expert in business ethics and corporate responsibility, believes companies should be training interns for the future, and not having them take over the duties of paid employees.
“Where unscrupulous employers take advantage is having you do work activities that have a benefit primarily to them,” Fields said. “Having you file papers so the employer saves costs of hiring a file clerk is illegal.”
In return for free work, companies often require that students receive academic credit, though it’s not legally required. While the credit makes it seem more beneficial to the student, schools usually require payment for the extra credits. USC, for example, charges $1,300 per credit, though students can get the credits cheaper through community colleges and then transfer the credits to their own school.
Many students don’t sign up to receive academic credit for their free work, including senior Liz Trawick, who is majoring in psychology and working as an unpaid intern for a city councilman.
“I’m doing a lot of work, but the city has no money, so that’s probably why I’m not getting paid,” Trawick said. “As a student, it’s reasonable not to be paid, but not being a student and not finding anything paid is unreasonable.”
Some students think an internship is not about making money but gaining experience.
“It’s not as much about getting paid as it is about learning, because the pay is really just a bonus,” said sophomore business major Kyle Manis, who held a paid internship with Verizon and is now looking at an unpaid Congressional internship.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison gave up nearly $50,000 per year in revenue Friday by deciding not to renew its contract with Nike Inc. because of alleged human rights abuses overseas. The University received annual royalties from the company because of its use of the University’s name, mascot and insignia.
UW-Madison is the first in the country to cut ties with Nike over this issue, but sophomore Jonah Zinn said students are raising the stakes at other schools as well.
"There are student movements going on at about 20 other universities and the goal is to pick up the momentum,” said Zinn, a member of the Student Labor Action Coalition, an affiliate of UW-Madison’s United Students Against Sweatshops. “But in order to get that momentum going, it's important to take that first step -- and it's a huge deal that UW-Madison was the first university to cut the contract. We won't be the last, for sure."
School officials said the University had no choice but to cut ties with Nike after a report detailing human rights abuses by the company in Honduras.
The Worker Rights Consortium (WRC) which inspects companies’ oversees practices stated that workers at two factories where Nike products were made, Hugger de Honduras and Vision Tex, did not receive severance pay when both factories closed. In total, the WRC alleges that Nike owes the workers more than $2 million - or about 30 weeks of pay per person - in legally mandated severance.
"Nike has not developed, and does not intend to develop, meaningful ways of addressing the plight of displaced workers and their families in Honduras," UW-Madison Chancellor Biddy Martin in a statement to the University’s Labor Licensing Policy Committee Friday.
"It has not presented clear long-range plans to prevent or respond to similar problems in the future. For this combination of reasons, we have decided to end our relationship for now."
The University’s relationship with Nike will officially end in late June, when the contract between the two parties expires. The main argument for not renewing the contract is that Nike did not follow the University code of conduct for producers, which states that companies must pay legally mandated wages, among other stipulations.
Some at the school are hoping other universities will follow the UW. A similar series of student campaigns and University decisions targeted Russell Athletic last year. Ultimately, student activists persuaded another sportswear company, Russell Athletic, to rehire 1,200 workers after the factories were closed. Nearly 100 colleges ended their deals with Russell during that campaign.
"The real difference here is that with the Russell contract, there were many, many other universities joining with us," said Collins. "And here, we are kind of out here on our own... So even though we are a small proportion of what Nike produces, I do think this will get Nike's attention. Even if no other schools join us, the publicity of Wisconsin doing this will matter."
Students enrolled in certain specialized courses at Lansing Community College in Michigan, will receive a refund of their tuition charges if they are not hired within the year following the courses.
The innovative program, “Get a Skill, Get a Job, or Get Your Money Back," applies to students taking six-week classes in technical fields that are currently in high demand in the state. The program will start in May.
“Many people are discouraged in job seeking,” said LCC President Brent Knight in an interview with the Lansing State Journal. “Why spend money, take time to learn when you may not get a job?”
The current cost to enroll in classes ranges from $2150 to $2500. Only 12 to 15 students will be admitted into the program, according to the Lansing Community College website.
Accepted students will face certain requirements in order to be eligible for the refund. While attending Lansing Community College, they must demonstrate consistent class attendance and only high school graduates are eligible to enroll in the courses.
Students in the specialized courses are also required to take classes directed at improving their job skills. They must attend job fairs and be able to demonstrate that they have been actively seeking employment in order to remain in the program.
The Office of Student Conduct at the University of California at Berkeley sent letters to more than 100 student protesters offering them a choice between seven-month suspensions and formal hearings that could result in more severe disciplinary measures.
About 200 UC Berkeley student activists demonstrated Monday against the Code of Student Conduct that the school is using to hand down those suspensions.
Administrators describe the code of conduct as an educational tool, but student critics say that, unlike legal proceedings, it allows for vague charges, delayed hearings, and the use of insufficient evidence to prove guilt.
The protesters under notice of suspension were involved in the Nov. 20 Wheeler Hall occupation and protests during the Nov. 18-20 meeting of the UC Board of Regents and an “Open University” five-day sit-in in a school building staged at the end of the last semester. According to the code of conduct, students accused of violations should receive notification of their charges within 30 days of knowledge of the alleged violation and notice of a hearing must be sent within 45 days thereafter.
"The university has decided—unilaterally, without public notice, and without following the proper procedure—to abolish for 2009-10 the timeline that ensures students a speedy resolution to allegations of wrongdoing," said Thomas Frampton, a student at Boalt Hall School of Law who is advising some of those now facing conduct charges. "As a result, students' degrees may be withheld this spring, simply because the university doesn't feel that students' right to a reasonably speedy hearing matters."
Susan Trageser, director of the Office of Student Conduct said that the normal deadline for notifying students of code violations was broken after the policy was suspended over the summer due to the university-wide employee furlough program.
“We still use the timeline as a guideline, but there are instances where we can’t follow it exactly,” she said. “Calendars can get pretty full, and we only have three staff. We try to get everybody in.”
Students like senior Kyla Collins—who spoke at the Monday rally—may miss their expected graduations this year because of the suspensions and disciplinary delays. Involved in the Wheeler Occupation and “Open University” protests, she is facing a seven-month suspension and does not expect to have a hearing for at least a month.
“They cited furloughs,” she said, “which is a slap in the face because that is what we are fighting.”
Doctoral student Callie Maidhof, who also faces a seven-month suspension, said the student conduct process is deliberately outside the public legal system.
“There’s a reason that none of us are facing [criminal] charges; so it’s essentially double jeopardy,” she said. “We already do not have charges in the legal system because they don’t have enough on us.”
