Students’ voices lead to legislative success
Katie Clark - February 28th, 2008About 25 NAU students traveled to the Capitol on Tuesday, Feb. 19 to mark the 21st Annual Student Lobby Day. The Arizona Students’ Association campaign “Brighten Arizona’s Future, Invest in Higher Education” coordinated the event.
ASA’s goals were to avoid university budget cuts, to increase financial aid and to pass textbook legislation that would make textbooks more affordable.
“It’s the day where students from across the state come together with one unified voice through ASA to the capitol to talk about student issues,” said Rich Williams, core coordinator and undergraduate delegate for ASA.
According to the Arizona Republic, the 2008 budget deficit, which legislators have less than five months to close, is now at $1.15 billion; for 2009 it will be $1.73 billion.
At lobby day, there were talks of a budget cut of $50 million for all Arizona universities. NAU would take a $17 million budget cut.
“We are 47th in the nation in regards to financial aid, and with the budget crisis they are looking at lowering back higher education funding because of the deficit,” Williams said. “It’s going in and out of committee, but any money out of higher education is a bad investment.”
Students were allowed to eat lunch with legislators of Flagstaff and discuss issues like tuition, Arizona’s budget crisis and financial aid.
Michael Elmore, a sophomore administration of justice major, has attended lobby day for the past two years. He discussed issues with Representative Tom Chabin of District 2.
“Actually speaking to the legislator for an hour was very informative,” Elmore said. “But I would have rather spoken with a legislator from a different side. Chabin was very upfront and all for the issues we discussed.”
Students were then given the option of attending either the House’s Higher Education Committee Meeting to hear two fellow students testify on behalf of the student-initiated textbook legislation or to at tend the Senate Appropriations Meeting to hear a debate about the budget.
Morgan Coffinger, a senior political science major, attended the Senate hearing, but was disappointed with the lack of some legislators’ knowledge about key issues pertaining to the student movement.
“It was important to be here to say that we are actually affected by what happens,” Coffinger said. “In the hearing, Senator Flake from Snowflake actually said ‘Yeah, I wish I had more information on this issue, but I guess I will just vote yes.’”
Most students attended the Higher Education Committee, where student-initiated textbook legislation H2230 was discussed and questioned by representatives.
“We really are here today with one voice to say invest in higher education…and the final thing we are here today is for textbook legislation that has been three years in the making,” Williams said.
This legislation is designed to make textbooks more affordable by requiring publishers to provide information to faculty and university representatives upon request. The information provided would include the suggested retail price, wholesale price and the copyright dates of previous editions.
“I think we definitely need to lower prices and the first step is to have them disclose the prices upfront and have them disclose more information about the books,” said Chris Durand, a sophomore advertising and public relations major who attended the meeting.
According to the Arizona Board of Regents textbook task force, Arizona university students spend an average of $816 to $950 each year on textbooks and supplies, which equals about one-fifth of a student’s in-state tuition.
The legislation would also require publishers to unbundle supplemental materials such as workbooks and CDs.
About 30 students attended the meeting from all three in-state universities and some testified in support of the bill.
“I am here to come and support the original legislation that was proposed,” Williams said. “The state puts so much money into resources, into educating citizens and publishers come take advantage of this broken market.”
The bill passed, but not without an amendment that is said to take away from what the bill is intended to accomplish. The bill does not include price disclosure upfront and it does not require the unbundling of textbooks and supplemental materials.
Despite the defeat, Coffinger said they were able to have legislators witness their dedication to an afforable education.
“We witnessed and were a presence so the legislators could see that we actually do care what happens,” Coffinger said.