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New
bill to fund students' financial aid
By
Katie Plourd
Online Forty-Niner
Staff Writer
If
passed, a new bill will provide billions
of dollars in funding towards financial
aid in California's public universities
in an attempt to make it easier for residents
to attend college here.
According
to the annual report from the National Center
for Public Policy and Higher Education (NCPPHE),
California is at risk when it comes to getting
students to attend public universities.
The
number of students attending high school
in the state is on the rise, yet the likelihood
of the students attending college after
graduation is declining, says the NCPPHE.
The
problems is caused by high school students
not taking enough college prep classes in
high school and high school graduates are
not going to college right after graduation.
Another
cause may be financial disadvantage, according
the report. The net cost of going to a public
university in California is over 50 percent
of the income for a low- to middle-income
family. This makes it very difficult for
students in those situations to attend,
says the NCPPHE.
Son
Tran, a third year student at Cal State
Long Beach, said that those who receive
grants and loans from the government do
not have to worry so much about the financial
burden of a college education. He thinks
that such financial aid helps students a
lot.
"If
you have grants it makes it less of a problem,"
Tran says. "I have grants and scholarships
so I never look at money as a problem."
The
California Hope Endowment proposed by California
State Treasurer Phil Angelides claims that
it can help the financial situation in California's
public higher education system.
According
to the National Association of College and
University Business Officers, the California
Hope Endowment will provide the seventh-largest
amount of funds to universities in the nation.
Harvard, Yale, Princeton, MIT and University
of Texas and Stanford rank higher.
The
proposal has two parts, Angelides said.
The first is the Cal Hope Trust. The trust
will help California manage its state-owned
property through a high-charged real estate
business.
The
state-owned property in California would
first be transferred from the government
to a public trust corporation. From there
it would be managed like any real estate
business.
The
endowment would yield $2 billion in over
10 years for California's financial aid
fund through the neglected public asset
of state-owned real estate.
This
asset would be enough to provide complete
scholarships to 385,000 community college
students or 19,000 students in the California
State University System, according to Angelides.
The
Endowment will support and give funding
to many different programs to help increase
students in California to earn a college
degree, Angelides say.
Tran
supports the idea of the government doing
more to help Californians attain a degree.
"I
think the government should play a big role
in helping people go to school," he
says.
"A
lot of tax money is going to them and that
money should be spent on education before
a lot of other things."
The
bill proposes that the funds operate like
a charitable function by accepting donations
from individuals and businesses and to be
governed by a public board of trustees appointed
by the governor and members of different
governing boards, says Angelides.
The
California Hope Endowment was announced
on Feb. 17 and will go before the state
legislature in mid March.
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