Inside the Glass: Would you like fries with your degree?

On Oct. 23, 2013, “The Salt Lake Tribune” reported that Utah’s increase in tuition “this year was in line with the nation’s at 3 percent.” However, on March 29, 2013, the Board of Regents approved an increase of 5 percent for six of eight higher education institutes and a 6 percent increase–double what the Tribune reported–for Salt Lake Community College and Utah Valley University.

As students we need to be aware of what we are paying and what we are going to owe when we leave college. A college education no longer guarantees a good job after graduation. Recent graduates have been faced with prolonged unemployment as the Baby Boomers either cannot financially or will not leave their jobs.

The Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco reported that 58 percent of all jobs gained after the 2008-2010 recession paid less than $13.83 an hour, while 60 percent of the jobs lost during the recession paid between $13.84 and $21.13 per hour.

This means that upon graduation, students will be fortunate enough to find a job that uses their skills, pays a decent wage and allows them to pay back the incredible amount of debt incurred after an increase of tuition over the last five years (2008-2013) of 33 percent at SLCC.

Students can do something to stem the tide of rising tuition, but this means taking time out of their daily schedule to meet with legislators and to send emails to the state government leaders to fully fund higher education.

A community college is not the place to rack up student debt because of high tuition rates. SLCC students need to take the power that 64,000 voters should have and use it to make sure that an education ends up helping financially rather than hurting.

Otherwise, we have no one to despise but ourselves when we are asking people after graduation if they would like fries with their order.