“Even if we are challenging the governor, we are asking you to inspire us with leadership, and come up with a solution that will solve this problem,” UNO student government president David Teagle told the House Appropriations committee Wednesday.
Teagle was one of several hundred college students from around the state who showed up at the capitol to protest proposed cuts to higher education.
First they rallied on the capitol steps, with support from legislators like Baton Rouge Rep. Ted James.
“I will not vote for a budget that will reduce one penny to higher education,” James promised, stirring a round of cheers and applause.
After the rally, students testified before House Appropriations, telling the members exactly what the cuts are doing to their college experience and to their future.
“There are certain courses that I’m no longer able to take, because professors have moved on,” McNeese State student Morgan Miller said. “I know of 12 that are not coming back to my university next semester. And that decreases my value of my degree.”
Grambling student body president Eric Johnson told me he’s supposed to graduate in December. Now he’s not sure if he can.
“It’s time to register for fall, and currently we have no classes in the system,” Johnson said. “So right now, you don’t know what classes are going to be available.”
Johnson is concerned this may be the first indication that Grambling will be closed or merged with Louisiana Tech or U-L Monroe. Lily Bourgeois, a pre-med student at Nicholls, is also worried her college is on the chopping block.
“As of now, Nicholls receives $17-million a year from state appropriations,” Bourgeois told the committee. “If this budget cut does happen, Nicholls will only receive $4-million, and this is definitely not enough to keep the university up and running.”
But it was UNO’s Teagle who pointed a finger at lawmakers, telling them students see these cuts — and all the previous ones over the past seven years — as an “epic fail” on the part of the legislature. He warned that students are holding lawmakers responsible for doing — or not doing — their job.
“No longer will we accept when a budget shortfall comes, we can only cut the budget from two things — health care and higher education,” Teagle stated. “The people in this building have the power to change that.”