speak out: Education: it's not a right
Terrence Chan, Special to the Peak

The evil SFU Board of Governors has voted to raise student tuitions, probably as a result of the evil B.C. Liberal government's evil corporate tax cuts. Will the horrible oppression of the neo-liberal agenda ever cease?

Blame abounds, but what I want to know is: what solutions are you proposing, anyway? I'm talking to anyone who has ever protested a tuition fee hike, or a government spending cut, or even thought that it's so horrible that our tuitions are on the increase so that the school can cover its costs. What's your grand plan to save education?

One alternative is to keep tuitions frozen, of course. Firstly, one should recognise that those who attended post-secondary education in B.C. during the tuition freeze were essentially subsidised by students of the past and future. It is because we failed to pay an increased tuition for six years that students in the future will have to pay more, and not get any additional services for this increased fee. Keeping tuitions frozen would obviously mean budget trimming. We could cut student services like advisors, cleaning staff, security, food services and so forth. Or perhaps we could pay the already low-paid professors even less, at least until they leave for a school actually willing to pay for their services.

We could have the government increase taxes and spending on higher education. From what I have read in the Peak, this seems like the popular alternative among progressive students in the school. I suppose it would remain popular at least until all the investment capital leaves the province, leaving an underemployed (but very highly educated!) workforce.

There is a simple solution to the dilemma of attending school full-time and actually trying to finance it without either lining up on street corners for soup and bread or dying of exhaustion from both a full-time job and school. It's a one-word solution with a bad reputation: debt. It's not a particularly nice word, but debt is nothing to be ashamed or fearful of. Going into debt is merely the transference of future income flows to make them present income flows. When you borrow, you are putting up your future skills and earnings so that you can pay for your education now. You are not selling your soul to the financial institution or pleading for a handout. Really.

The return on investment for any university degree is substantial. None of us will be put so far in debt because of the tuition increases that we will not be able to get ourselves out of it after a few years of hard, productive, full-time work. You might get pretty far in debt because of other things, but we're talking solely about tuition here. This is unless future students decide that we - now presumably full-time workers - and the businesses we work for need to pay more taxes, meaning we earn less and are less likely to be employed.

I trust most people who take care to study the numbers will not challenge what I have written above. So I'll end on a more controversial note. Folks, education is not a right. There, I said it. As it is the joint product of the work of many individuals, education cannot be free - someone has to pay for it. If that someone is not you (or someone who cares enough for you to put you through school), then by definition, it is being stolen!

There can be no right to free education any more than there could be a right to break into someone's locker and steal their wallet. Please consider this the next time you hold a placard vehemently asserting your "right to education."

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