college affordabilty

The Des Moines Register-hosted Republican debate included a meatball question about education.  Progressives need to note what Giuliani said and learn how to correct his lies.

"Parents should choose the school that their child goes to, the same way people choose higher education," Giuliani said.

"Has it ever occurred to us that higher education is still the very, very best in the world, and you're asking me about K-12? Well, higher education is based on choice. It's based on a large consumer market. It's based on competition."

"It's the area of K-12 where we have this government command, sort of, approach. And if we give the choice to parents, where they can choose a private school or parochial school or public school, a charter school, home schooling, let them be the decider."

If only the world were as simple as Rudolph Giuliani...  thinks it is.

No sooner had I put together my last post, when I saw a new group on facebook being pushed by my pal Matt Browner-Hamlin, who is currently working for Chris Dodd, that aims to improve the loans offered to college students. The group is called Student Loan Transparency Now! and it's set up to highlight a bill that Dodd recently introduced into the banking committee. From Dodd's campaign blog:

Recently Senator Dodd introduced the Private Student Loan Transparency and Accountability Act. The Dodd legislation extends new protections to all private student loans in order to improve transparency, prevent unfair and deceptive private lending practices and eliminate conflicts of interest. CNNMoney.com says "Student lenders would have to better disclose their rates and would be banned from discriminatory underwriting practices under legislation introduced Friday by U.S. Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd, D-Conn" Accounting Web has more on what the bill does, as well as complimentary efforts being done by New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo.

Check out Dodd's Senate sight for more info on the bill. This San Francisco Chronical article is a good place to start for background on this important issue.

Please help spread the word on the Private Student Loan Transparency and Accountability Act! It's not often that politicians in DC pay attention to the needs of young people, and we really need to try and reward politicians that do, with attention, volunteering, donations, etc. If more pols would push legislation like this I'm guessing it wouldn't be nearly as hard to attract young people to the polls on election day.

BTW, if you haven't read it already, please check out the Nation article about Matt's jump to the Dodd campaign. Matt's convinced me: at the moment, if Al Gore doesn't run, Chris Dodd has my vote. Only a few million more voters to go!

Smart policy, smart politics from the Democrats, and good work from a coalition of youth groups.

The Democrats have promised to make college affordability legislation one of their "first 100 hours" priorities. This may seem like a "safe" and relatively unimportant initiative, but college unaffordability (and the oppressive debt that comes along with it) is arguably the greatest crisis facing young Americans today.

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On January 11, a coalition including Campus Progress, Campaign for America's Future, PIRGs, and Rock the Vote will hold National Day to Make College Affordable event in DC and lobby Congress to make good on their promise. To show support, you can join their Facebook group (they already have over 2,700 members and they'll announce their total membership numbers at the event) or you can get directly involved with phone banking and letter writing (email Campus Progress for info at organize@campusprogress.org).

The Facebook group is a fantastic resource, too.