By Kristina Chew

College tuition keeps going up and also the amount of debt students and their families take on. College costs more not because of professors’ salaries: The Chronicle of Higher Education says that, according to the latest data from the 2011 Census, about 360,000 of the 22 million Americans with master’s degrees or higher in 2010 were receiving some kind of public assistance. While that is a small number in comparison to the total 44 million people nationally who received food stamps or some other form of public aid, hearing about Ph.D.’s subsisting on food stamps undermines the routinely-repeated claim that the more educated you are, the more $$$ you’ll make.

The Chronicle notes that those who do not attend graduate school are more likely to receive food stamps. But the percentage of those holding a graduate degree or higher who were receiving food stamps or some form of aid doubled between 2007 and 2010. For those holding a master’s degree, the figure for those receiving aid rose from 101,682 to 293,029. The increase was even more extreme for those with a Ph.D., with the number of those receiving assistance climbing from 9,776 to 33,655.

These figures might even be higher as graduate-degree holders may refrain from reporting that they are on public assistance.

The Chronicle describes three professor’s stories:

43-year-old Melissa Bruninga-Matteau has a Ph.D. in medieval history from the University of California at Irvine. She receives $900/month for teaching two humanities courses at Yavapai College, in Prescott, Arizona; a single mother, she receives food stamps and Medicaid.

Matthew Williams is the cofounder and vice president of the New Faculty Majority, an advocacy organization for non-tenured faculty. He earned $21,000 a year while teaching from 2007-2009 at the University of Akron and also relied on food stamps and Medicaid.

51-year-old Elliott Stegall is a graduate student finishing his dissertation in film studies at Florida State University. He and his wife have two young children; they receive food stamps, Medicaid, and aid from the Women, Infants, and Children program (WIC). Stegall currently teaches two courses each semester in the English department at Northwest Florida State College, in Niceville, Florida, and has also painted houses, worked for a catering company and cleaned condominiums to make ends meet.

As Michael Bérubé, president of the Modern Language Association and an English professor at Penn State University, says, “Everyone thinks a Ph.D. pretty much guarantees you a living wage and, from what I can tell, most commentators think that college professors make $100,000 and more.”

Sure, there are professors who make that much (in case you’re wondering, not the person writing this post). But full-time, tenured and tenure-track professors now comprise only 30 percent of faculty at the U.S.’s colleges and universities. The majority of college faculty — that is, most of the individuals teaching the majority of undergraduate courses — are adjuncts, part-time faculty who are not tenure-track, who do not receive health benefits and who make an average of $600 to $10,000 per course and, therefore, salaries that are far shy of six figures. As many schools have limits on how many courses an adjunct can teach (typically the maximum is two — any more and an adjunct would have so full a teaching load as to qualify for benefits), it is not uncommon for adjuncts to teach a course at this college and another two at that university, and another at another school, to cobble together something of a salary and pay for the gas to drive to all those schools.

(A good friend of ours who received his Ph.D. some years ago has been teaching about eight courses a semester at different schools in a midwestern city for several years.)

So many students today cannot afford college — and, more and more, too many professors cannot afford to teach them.

By Elayne Clift

Is there any hope for college adjuncts?

It was never my intention to teach when I was in the throes of my career as a health communications and gender specialist. But when I was invited to be a lecturer at Yale University’s School of Public Health I discovered I loved teaching, and was pretty good at it. From there I went on to various teaching gigs at institutions as diverse as community colleges, Ivy League schools and Thai universities. Not having a Ph.D., I was relegated to the world of adjuncts, but never having aspired to the academic world of “publish or perish,” I was happy.

As time went on, however, I began to experience the drawbacks of being an adjunct. Frustrations began with being paid a pittance for extremely labor-intensive, high responsibility work. While private universities paid about $5,000 (plus expenses), state institutions were offering $2,000 or less a semester. Given today’s cost of living, that’s gas money, or if you are burdened with oversubscribed online courses, the bottle of hooch you need to get through the week.

Beyond pay scales there were other issues. For example, most adjuncts cannot collect unemployment if the semester they were promised falls through. If classes are undersubscribed they may have to accept pro-rated payment (make that half a tank of gas). They have no office space, no benefits or salary increases unless they’re unionized, no hope of professional development funds, and no job security.

And yet, adjuncts comprise a large percentage of faculty in institutions of higher education, sometimes approaching 50 percent of teachers at public institutions. We bring special expertise and often years of experience to the classroom. We could bring those skills to committees too if we were incentivized to do so. We are skilled professionals who spend hours planning and delivering courses, evaluating, mentoring and counseling students, and responding to administrative demands.

I thought things might be looking up for adjunct faculty when, a while back, I received a letter from the new president of a college where I was teaching. His letter was a call for better recognition of adjunct faculty.

“The need for an accessible, quality education has never been greater,” he wrote. “Your willingness to give your time and share your experience makes a tremendous difference in the lives of students we serve.” With that in mind, the president, a former adjunct himself, announced a “new model for part-time faculty that better recognizes the role (they play).”

But things don’t look so hopeful these days. Another college where I’ve taught — part of the same state system in which the new college president works — has begun a rigorous campaign to remove long-time, unionized adjuncts, replacing them with less qualified “newbies” burdened with ever larger classes.

A recent article posted on AlterNet questioned whether we are about to see an “Adjunct Spring.” It pointed out that over the last 30 years colleges have grown more reliant on adjunct faculty as a way to cut costs while simultaneously trying to stop them from organizing for better pay and benefits. But work conditions are often abysmal. For example, office space is small and shared and there is no clerical support.

There is some pushback in the face of lowering standards and unfair labor practices. One adjunct lecturer has started an online presence called the Adjunct Project. According to AlterNet, its documentation of adverse conditions has resonated with faculty around the country. After several weeks the database had more than 1600 entries about pay, working conditions and personal experiences. It’s the Angie’s List of Academia.

Education, as we know, is in crisis in this country. When we talk about that crisis, we emphasize K-12. But an invisible crisis exists in colleges and universities and it’s getting worse. Just compare where we are with higher education standards and practices in other industrialized nations. In the U.K., for example, students not only know how to write fluently in English, they also tend to speak another language.

They are taught how to argue logically based on research and empirical evidence. Our students prefer easier methods of learning, which overburdened teachers often yield to in the interest of their own sanity.

Respect for, rather than exploitation of, part-time faculty can go far to improve academic standards, provide quality learning environments, and guide students toward successful futures. Our kids deserve that. So do our teachers.

You don’t need a Ph.D. to know that much.

Originally published in the Keane Source-Sentinel. Reprinted here with permission.

By Stefan Ostrach

A new faculty union at the University of Oregon was certified by the Oregon Employment Relations Board on April 27th, shortly after the university’s administration dropped legal objections it had filed against the proposed bargaining unit, which included tenure-related faculty, non-tenure-track faculty, adjunct instructors, and officers of research.

The new union is United Academics of the University of Oregon, a joint affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers and the independent American Association of University Professors. The new union will include most faculty and research employees at the university, totaling around 1,700 members.

United Academics is the largest bargaining unit to win union certification through the card-check provisions of Oregon’s public sector labor law.

United Academics submitted cards to the Oregon board on March 13, 2012 from a majority of the faculty designating it as their union. Lawyers for the university subsequently filed objections to the proposed bargaining unit that would have gutted the union. The university would have preferred two bargaining units, one for tenured and tenure-related faculty and another unit of non-tenured faculty.

The board set hearing dates for early May, but the university’s administration and the union reached an agreement prior to the hearing, with the help of Democratic Governor John Kitzhaber.

Duke Shepard, labor and human services policy adviser to the governor, said that Kitzhaber “communicated quite a bit” with the university administration. Kitzhaber’s position was, Shepherd explained, “If a majority wants a union, they should be able to have it.”

Shepard, a former political director at the Oregon AFL-CIO, personally communicated back and forth with both the union and the university.

“We felt it was in everyone’s best interest to come to a swift resolution,” he said.

Shepard conveyed Kitzhaber’s view that it would be “productive to start negotiating a contract and not have a protracted fight over who is in and out” of the bargaining unit, he said. “Our assessment was the case law is on the side of unionization of workers who want it.”

The objections were resolved with an agreement that 49 employees were exempt from representation as managers and another 161 would be excluded “at this time, because they currently have supervisory authority.” The union and administration also agreed on a process for resolving disputes about other supervisory or confidential positions, consistent with state law.

“We now have the official means to negotiate and collectively bargain for better working conditions, transparency, and accountability,” the union said in an email to faculty members.

In an email to faculty, interim University of Oregon President Robert Berdahl said the university “acknowledged from the beginning that our faculty has the right to organize. We did not oppose the organization effort, nor did we support it. We simply recognized the rights of those who chose this route.”

Berdahl continued, “Within that process, we wanted to ensure that the proposed bargaining unit was appropriate. That is why we worked with the union leadership to make certain that the bargaining unit is defined early on. We now have certainty and we can move forward.”

By Blair Kerkhoff

Henry Lyons loves University of Missouri-Kansas City. He wants that established from the start.

He graduated from the university, has donated to UMKC and the school is listed as a beneficiary in his will.

“But I feel I have to do this,” Lyons said.

“This” is blowing the whistle on what Lyons believes is questionable academic practice involving a student-athlete at UMKC. (Watch a video of Lyons speaking about the alleged grade change scheme, below.)

Lyons was serving as an adjunct professor when he alleged a failing grade was changed to a passing grade by the university to benefit an athlete.

Lyons wouldn’t identify the student-athlete, nor would the school, citing privacy laws. But Lyons said the person was a member of a “major sports team” at UMKC.

The class, Career and Life Development, was part of the curriculum in the fall semester, 2010. Lyons said the student-athlete failed the course, and that touched off a series of conversations between Lyons and school officials that resulted in an “F” being changed to a passing grade against Lyons’ protest.

“It’s the arrogance of the system,” Lyons said. “This is not a personal agenda. It’s about what’s right.”

Lyons said he has sent a letter to the NCAA detailing his version of the events and asking for an investigation.

UMKC says it welcomes the NCAA scrutiny but that Lyons is off base.

“Mr. Lyons’ charges are completely baseless and absolutely false,” said UMKC chancellor Leo E. Morton in a statement through the university. “We are delighted by the prospect of a thorough investigation of these charges by the NCAA. We hope they will decide to investigate. If they do, we will cooperate to the maximum extent possible, and we will look forward to the public release of their findings.”

NCAA spokesperson Stacey Osburn couldn’t confirm whether the NCAA has received information from UMKC.

“But if we receive information about any potential rules violation, the enforcement staff will look at it, assess its credibility and look into it further to determine if it’s a violation,” Osburn said.

The NCAA attempts to work with the school in these matters.

“Depending on the specific situation, if at all possible, we would work in coordination with the school to get to the bottom,” Osburn said. “There are times that for a variety of reasons that there was a misunderstanding of what is and what isn’t allowed under NCAA rules.”

Academic integrity must be the mindset of college sports, said NCAA president Mark Emmert, speaking at the Final Four last month. The NCAA is about to toughen its academic initial eligibility requirements.

“I think the best way to think of our academic reforms is to recognize that this is really an issue that’s at the core of the collegiate model of our whole enterprise,” Emmert said. “The notion that our student-athletes are just that, students who happen to be athletes, and that we’re very serious about that student component.”

In this instance, the student-athlete’s eligibility was not at stake, according to a source familiar with the situation but not authorized to comment publicly.

Under NCAA eligibility rules, student-athletes must pass a minimum of six hours to be eligible for the following semester. Student-athletes must complete 40 percent of their coursework toward a degree by the end of their second year, 60 percent by the end of their third year and 80 percent by the end of their fourth. They have a total of five years to graduate while on an athletic scholarship.

This student-athlete was meeting those criteria, according to the source. But Lyons is skeptical.

“Then why did they fight this so much?” Lyons said.

Three others in the class, which had 22 students, received failing grades, according to Lyons, but he said the university didn’t challenge him on those marks.

Lyons contends that the student-athlete failed the course based on a semester-ending paper combined with a D-minus on the final exam. A few weeks later, Lyons said, he received a telephone call from Reggie Bassa, director of the school’s Program for Adult Continuing Education, which oversaw the course.

“He said there seems to be problem with the student’s grade,” Lyons said. “I told him there was no problem. The student got what he or she deserved and earned.”

There would be an appeal of the grade, Bassa told Lyons.

At UMKC, a grade can be challenged through an appeals process. The final appeal is to the Academic Standards Committee, which is composed of faculty members.

Lyons said he was asked by Bassa to present papers from other students to compare to the student-athlete’s failed work.

“No problem,” Lyons said. “The work speaks for itself.”

Lyons said he soon after received an email from Bassa saying Lyons was to allow the student to write another paper, re-grade it, and give the student points for class participation, which Lyons has offered to all of his students.

“How would they know this person participated?” Lyons said. “I told him that’s not how it works in my class.”

Another paper was written, and Lyons was asked to grade it. Lyons told the university he wanted to make his own appeal but said he was told that couldn’t happen until he graded the re-written paper.

“I can’t appeal a decision until I grade a paper that I don’t think should have been written in the first place?” Lyons said. “It just didn’t sound right to me.”

Lyons started to hear that his grading of the initial paper didn’t contain enough instructional feedback, and he said his syllabus was questioned — the same syllabus that he said he’d been using since he started teaching in 2008 and that had been approved by the department.

When Lyons went to check on his course schedule for this semester, he saw that it was no longer being offered. UMKC director of media relations John Martellaro said the school would not comment on the status of Lyons’ class.

Melvin C. Tyler, UMKC’s vice chancellor for student affairs and enrollment management said the school is not aware of any misuse of the appeals process.

“Our academic procedures allow any student to challenge a course grade through a series of appeals,” Tyler said. “The final appeal is to an Academic Standards Committee composed of faculty members elected by their peers. We are not aware of any case in the past two years in which any grade appeal by any student bypassed this process. We are confident that all recommendations made by the committee are academically justified.”

Ameera Butt

The 28-year-old explained molecules in the atmosphere are hit by light from the sun and absorb either all or some of the colors of the light spectrum. Molecules absorb the blue light — and that blue light is emitted, giving us a blue sky.

The native Ukrainian fell in love with molecules, light, chemicals and all things chemistry in 2001 when she was a student at Merced College.

After moving to the United States to get a better education, Stavytska-Barba said she wanted to be an engineer but was influenced by a teacher, Krista Wilson, who inspired her to become a chemistry major.

“Science made so much sense, I wanted to teach and it seems really rewarding having students who go on,” she said.

Stavytska-Barba (pictured left) has been a part-time chemistry teacher at Merced College since 2011. She was recognized for being an outstanding part-time faculty member in the science discipline by the Academic Senate at the college’s board of trustees meeting last week. She was one of six adjunct faculty members who were recognized, according to Robin Shepard, public information officer for Merced College. There are approximately 420 part-time faculty at the college, according to Shepard.

She was nominated for the award by Wilson.

The awards started three years ago, highlighting the work and recognizing part-time teachers at Merced College, according to Keith Law, Merced College Faculty Association president.

“The main point is to give them a face,” Law said. “They were invisible before.”

Not only does Stavytska-Barba juggle two lectures and two labs with more than 100 students, she also has been a graduate student at UC Merced since 2006.

She was looking to work with a good professor and ended up working with professor Anne Kelley at UC Merced. “Her lab is really good,” Stavytska-Barba said.

She hopes to get to defend her dissertation and receive her doctorate in physical chemistry in two weeks. Her dissertation deals with spectroscopy, which is the study of light and matter.

Her favorite memory of teaching students at the college is when a re-entry student in her class was showing great progress with the material. Re-entry students are typically students who are older but come back to receive an education. “She is working so hard,” Stavytska-Barba said. “It’s a pleasure to have somebody (like that) in your class.”

When asked about her love of chemistry, she said, “I think because everything in our life depends on chemistry, when trees grow, you think of chemistry. Everything you encounter in your life deals with chemistry. It’s kind of interesting.”

This originally appeared in the Merced Sun-Star and is used here with permission.

By Jenny Ortiz

It’s no secret that as a society, we get our basic legal information from the television show “Law & Order.” When I interact with students, most cite this show along with “CSI,” “NCIS” and “House” as their favorites because they’re based on “real life.” I love television more than most, but I also know that not all my information about the United States legal system should come solely from actress Mariska Hargitay. I understand the need to read and research a variety of articles and primary sources in order to form and support my own opinions. Recently, however, I realized that the euphoric feeling I get from researching and proving my own points without falling back on cliches is not a thrill shared by my students. My students like cliches. For them, proving a point is pointless and unnecessary.

They’d rather fail the assignment than stop spouting their unsupported opinions or turn to a primary text for evidence.

At Adelphi University, I wanted my students to learn how to be persuasive in their academic writing, so we read “Adams” by George Saunders in class, then I proceeded to play devil’s advocate. The students disagreed with me, as I knew they would, but they couldn’t prove their points, as I knew they wouldn’t. Though I kept telling them to use the text, they continued to repeat their opinions. One student not only disagreed with me, but became so upset with the assignment that he caused a scene in class. He stated that not only did he not have to prove common sense, but that I was wrong and that he wasn’t paying attention to the discussion anymore. He didn’t give a…add your own colorful words. Rather than argue, I simply smiled and told him we could discuss it in class. I finished the lecture by showing the students how to prove the point they wanted to formulate using textual evidence.

After class, the student who made a scene tried to flee, but I caught him before he could run out. I explained to him that academia, like it or not, was about discussion. I also told him that I had taken the opposing view so that the students could think. He was bewildered that I could argue a point I didn’t agree with. As he began to feel better about our discussion, he (not yelling this time) explained that he didn’t understand why he had to prove his point using the text if he could make a strong argument using common sense to which I explained not all common sense is common sense.

In the end, he didn’t do the assignment, but realized his actions were rash. He apologized and we moved on with the week. However, this is only one example of students who are unwilling to compromise in their perspectives. Being strong-willed and opinionated is fantastic, but many of these students are not backing up their statements or opinions with solid proof. Academia is about being challenged every day and in every lecture. These students were willing to challenge their professors and their fellow students, but when asked to prove their own points they became defensive and turned to cliches.

In a society where we all have opinions, we are rarely asked to justify them. Likes and dislikes are created based on shallow and on the surface information as opposed to research and thought-provoking questions. There are the students who want to be challenged, the students who awaken to the process of learning, students who understand instinctively what it means to learn but then there are other students that refuse to be challenge and will cause a scene to avoid such challenges. Perhaps this event happened because I was working with a group of traditional freshmen and their world has yet to open…it is my hope that this is the case as I fear what it means if this isn’t the case.

What are your thoughts? What are your solutions to the unchallenged student?

About the Freeway Flyer: Jenny Ortiz is a quite serious 25 year old New Yorker, except when unicorns (specifically chubby unicorns) are involved. When she isn’t pleading with Kurt Sutter via Twitter to be her mentor, she is teaching at St. John’s University, Adelphi University, and LaGuardia Community College (see, quite serious). When she isn’t teaching, she’s hanging out with her friends showing off  earth and water bending skills (not serious, but super fun).  When she is alone and it’s raining, she likes to read Haruki Murakami, or listen to the Broken Bells and daydream.  If you want to be a fan, you can read Jenny’s work on fictionatwork.com, Blink-ink.com, Jersey Devil Press, dogeatcrow.com, Break Water Review,Stone Highway Review, Eighty Percent Magazine and InkSpill Magazine…or you can follow her on Twitter: twitter.com/jnylynn.

by Timothy Sandoval

About a dozen Sacramento State University faculty members set up shop near the university library to enlist support and sign up other faculty to authorize a possible strike because of stalled contract negotiations with the chancellor’s office.

About 24,000 members of the California Faculty Association across the 23-campus California State University system started voting Monday on whether to give its board of directors the ability to authorize a strike that would take place next fall.

CSU faculty want a 1 percent raise and more job security for temporary faculty, but CSU administrators have said this is not feasible considering that the system has lost $970 million in state funding since 2008.

Faculty at the sign-up table at California State University, Sacramento, handed out shirts that said, “I don’t want to strike, but I will!”

“We have not had a raise in four years,” said campus CFA President Kevin Wehr. “The chancellor’s office has offered nothing on the table except for take-back proposals that would reduce the rights that faculty currently enjoy.”

Currently, part-time lecturers in the CSU system are given automatic three-year contracts to work after they have lectured for six years.

Administrators now want the contract to be contingent on a review of the faculty’s performance.

Administrators want to scale back the amount the system pays for faculty taking time off to do union work.

The faculty association has taken issue with these proposals.

Jennifer Murphy, assistant professor of sociology at CSUS, said she volunteered to help the CFA on Monday because she has been adversely affected by cutbacks in recent years. Murphy said she had to defer paying her student loans in 2009 as she took pay cuts due to furloughs and was never given a raise.

“For me, this is very much about the administration’s lack of respect for faculty and students,” Murphy said.

Fundi Kiburi, an ethnic studies lecturer at Sacramento State, brought his class over to the sign-up table where his students were handed some reading materials from CFA volunteers. Kiburi and several of his students declined a request for an interview.

Yeimi Lopez, an ethnic studies major who was not in Kiburi’s class, sat with three other students on a bench handing out reading materials and making signs in support of the faculty union.

Lopez, 22, said there was a lot at stake for students.

“The fact that our faculty are being overworked and getting more students affects me because I am getting less one-on-one time with my professor,” Lopez said. “If they are not rehiring faculty, that means they are going to try to cram more students into less sections. So it’s about the quality of education.”

Democratic Assemblyman Richard Pan, Bill Camp, executive secretary for Sacramento Central Labor Council, AFL-CIO and Ken Cooley, an 8th District Assembly candidate, showed up to speak in front of the sign-up table.

“Its very important that the leadership of the CSU work with the faculty and the faculty association to ensure we protect the quality of education here in California and the CSU system that is so critical for the future of California,” Pan said.

Camp called on all faculty to support the strike effort, and for voters to pass Gov. Jerry Brown’s tax initiative, which would raise the state sales tax and create a surcharge on upper-income earners.

He attacked the CSU board for not accepting the CFA’s proposals.

“It sounds to me like the board of trustees wants to do away with unions,” Camp said. “That is what this is all about.”

CSU spokesman Mike Uhlenkamp called Camp’s comments “inflammatory.”

Of the strike vote, Uhlenkamp said it was premature for faculty to be voting on authorizing a strike because the two sides legally still need to go through the process of “fact-finding,” which means an official from the Public Employment Relations Board would look at both sides and recommend a solution.

He said administrators are happy to have talks with the union at any time.

“Our hope is that we can come to an agreement that is favorable to both sides,” Uhlenkamp said.

by Josh Boak

The White House and Democratic lawmakers are scrambling to find funds to stop an expected doubling of student loan interest rates this summer, arguing that they’re heading off another potential blow to the economy.

But the new House GOP budget doesn’t include the $6 billion needed.

The Democratic strategy consists of shame and politics: Their way, they say, will save thousands of dollars for college students who already are swimming in debt. And if the Democratic lawmakers don’t get their way, parents signing tuition checks will be hearing about it ahead of the election.

“It will be a very potent issue, certainly on college campuses but definitely for students’ parents who are going through the financial aid process on the eve of the election,” said Rep. Joe Courtney (D-Conn.), who is sponsoring a bill backed by 109 Democrats to hold the rates down on the government-subsidized Stafford loans.

House Education and the Workforce Committee Chairman John Kline (R-Minn.) says that though he’d like to reduce college costs, paying for the loans with deficit spending isn’t the right way to go — and the only alternative would take away from other programs in his own budget for higher education financing.

So Courtney said Democrats are aiming to move a bill through the Senate to force the House’s hand. Among the options is Sen. Jack Reed’s (D-R.I.) measure to set interest rates on Stafford loans at the current 3.4 percent.

Student loans tap in to the broader Democratic message about economic fairness. At a time when the Federal Reserve is basically giving banks money for free, Treasury bonds are being sold at 2 percent and mortgage rates are 3.8 percent, Democrats say it’s outrageous to make college students pay 6.8 percent.

Nor can private student debt be wiped away by bankruptcy. Assistant Senate Majority Leader Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), in addition to backing Reed’s bill on interest rates, is sponsoring a measure to change that.

“Right now, we are facing a student debt bomb,” Durbin said. “We are moving to the equivalent of the subprime mortgage mess in student loans and we can’t make it any worse.”

The debt has ballooned past $1 trillion, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau announced last month. More than 37 million graduates and dropouts owe money.

“That number has gotten so big, it comes with actual consequences,” said Rich Williams, the higher education advocate for the U.S. Public Interest Research Group. “The amount of debt they have impacts important life decisions, like buying a home, whether they get married and have children.”

If the Stafford loan rates double, an average borrower would pay an additional $2,800 over the course of a decade, while someone who maxed out the available subsidized loans would owe an additional $5,000, Williams said.

Republican presidential front-runner Mitt Romney indicated at an Ohio campaign stop last month that the era of government loans and grants for education should end. “It would be popular for me to stand up and say, ‘I’m going to give you government money to pay for your college,’ but I’m not going to promise that,” he said. “And don’t expect the government to forgive the debt that you take on.”

The issue has not always been highly partisan, since 77 House Republicans — including 46 current House members — supported the 2007 conference report that lowered the interest rates and President George W. Bush signed it.

But five years later, Republicans say their concern is the trillion-dollar deficit. So to address the rising tuition costs without aggravating the federal debt load, the House passed a measure in February to limit regulation of higher education.

And to maintain the cheap loans, another higher-ed program would have to face the chopping block, said Jennifer Allen, a spokeswoman for the House Committee on Education and the Workforce.

“We are continuing discussions on action to help borrowers and ease the college cost burden for students and families,” Allen said. “Tackling the challenge of the Stafford loan interest rate increase will require tough choices.”

Democratic Hill staffers said their goal is to find offsets outside the higher-ed budget, but going that route requires support that has yet to materialize from the House Republican leadership.

All of this might leave the solution bowing more to basic political considerations.

“We’ve always seen student aid as a way to buy votes, or not to appear to be working against the middle class,” said Neal McCluskey, associate director of the Center for Educational Freedom at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank. “People of both major parties will continually vote to increase student aid, even if they know the realities, because no one wants to appear to be the bad guy.”

This piece appeared originally in Politico.com. It is used here with permission.