Students in Uproar Over Budget Cuts

In the face of Governor Andrew Cuomo's proposed $1.1 billion to SUNY, the SUNY Student Assembly is organizing a second annual "SUNY Palooza," a day of student advocacy in Albany.

"If our kids aren't getting educated, we can't have a future" says RCC Student Government President Marvin Matthews. "Every RCC student should try to make it [to SUNY Palooza]."

The SUNY Palooza event is planned for March 15, and the RCC Student Government is working on arranging for buses to take students to Albany, as they did last year.

According to RCC Executive Vice President Mort Myers, as per education law, the State of New York should contribute 40% of RCC's budget, but since 1970 this has only happened once, he said. This funding gap leaves students forced to cover the difference, in the form of tuition.

Explains Myers, "The way the system actually works is that it's not that Albany will take a look at our overall operating expenses and write us a check.  We get funded based on a base aid rate."

A base aid rate is where the state gives a certain amount of money per full time student.

In 2007, the base aid rate was $2765 per student— for 2011 it was $2034, a nearly 27 percent reduction.  This leaves students having to hypothetically pay more in tuition to make up for the lost revenue.

And while a nine percent rise in enrollment has helped keep RCC afloat, according to Myers, "I just don't see those numbers staying that way. Graduating seniors are only up one tenth of a percent for Rockland County"

The state's budget gap, estimated to be around $10 billion is one of the largest in the nation. Governor Cuomo, who ran on a platform of limited spending, does not state in his 27-page budget platform that he is "cutting" SUNY spending, only that the SUNY system will not be funded in a way that meets all its costs.

According to sophomore Ilana Grant, "The state has such a large deficit, everyone, including students needs to share in the pain."

Other disagreed, seeing the governor's proposed  "funding gap" as shortsighted or even "atrocious."

"Students are the future," said Ashley Kohl, a sophomore and treasurer of SGA. "If we don't invest in them, there is nothing to look forward to; the state should try as hard as they can to help us."

The SUNY Student Assembly is calling for a "rational tuition policy," one that takes all factors into account when talking about raising tuition.

According to Mr. Myers, "We cannot talk about rational tuition without discussing a rational state aid plan."

Any cuts that affect RCC will likely not be felt immediately, Mr. Myers said.  Tuition is not set to rise drastically, and there are no planned program or teacher cuts.

"RCC is very efficiently staffed," said Myers. "Our teachers are hired proportionally to the students in that department."