Dinner v. Diploma

There are ways to make due, it's called a pie budget. However, I think Middleman brought up a good point. Are we doing with education what we did with many other industries (i.e., automobiles) by turning it into an inflated and/or false necessity for all of humanity?

I get along fine without a car, as did billions of others for millenia before. But, as with all marketed products, there was a false sense of necessity created.

Don't get me wrong, some people's lives are much better with cars, but it's not a catch-all. Some people's lives are better with higher education, but it's not necessarily the cure all. Diff'rent strokes for diff'rent folks.

Many of the line workers for Seattle City Light make 80k without overtime. And everyone works overtime. In 2006, many made over 200k.

To the contrary: in several trades you can make $30-$50k a year after two years of training and apprenticeship. Examples of tradesmen who have the potential to make this kind of money would be plumbers, electricians, and massage therapists. I know dozens of smart, creative, motivated people who have chosen these careers -- some of whom chose that after they obtained their MAs and realized they weren't happy sitting at a desk fifty hours or more a week.

Going to college is not at all a requirement for living a comfortable, fulfilling life in America.

I do agree with you that if what you really want to requires a BA, you should of course pursue college. But if you can't afford to go to college at 18, and if you aren't even sure about what you would study at college if you could go, an excellent alternative is to work for a few years and save up some money.

For real people, since when is having a phone a luxury? It's not 1989 anymore dude, most people have cell phones INSTEAD of land lines. It's way cheaper, avoiding long distance fees. And you sure as hell aren't going to get that part time job if you don't have a phone.

And you know what, sure college is a commodity, but in this country it is essentially required if you ever want to make more than 25k a year. And honestly, trade school really isn't that much cheaper, and a waste of money if want you really want to do requires a BA (or MA, for most careers now - a BA gets you a fancy admin job now) that you plan on pursuing later.

@jwhieger: I think it's likely you had a phone, though. And I suspect that that's what the student has, a phone. It just happens to be a cell, which makes more sense for a transient student.

I don't know. These stories/anecdotes are hard to make sense of without more data. All I can say is that I doubt "the kids" are that different (in terms of self-reliance and independence) from previous years. If in fact significantly more are making trips to food banks now, it's because (I believe) they're responding to greater economic pressure, like many of the middle class people showing up at food banks because the mortgage leaves them short.

I lived off of Jack N Box $1 menu in college. Sad but true, I find it hard to believe that these food stamp Huskies can't find a part-time job or work in the food halls on campus to get by.

Also, a cellphone isn't a legit staple of life for a student, way back in the 90's every college student in America got by without them. It's doable.

being that this is the most educated city in America, a college education is pretty close to being an unalienable right if any sort of job is expected within King County, at least.

Go read CraigsList, look at the degree requirements for the lowliest shit

Regardless of whether you agree with students hitting up food banks, the fact of the matter is that students are hitting up food banks. Red flag that something needs to be changed in terms of the multi-million dollar education industry.

I found myself dumbfounded by the quote in the article from the student who was using food stamps because:

"Now that I'm in the apartment, I have to pay for food, and I have to pay my cell phone bill. I don't make enough to pay for both."

Maybe she should get rid of the cell phone so she can buy food if she can't afford both!

I don't think I'm saying that poor people shouldn't bother with college -- that's not at all what I'm trying to say, anyway. But going to college takes money, and if you can't get enough loans to cover your needs, then I believe it won't hurt you (may in fact help you out a LOT) to take some time to learn a trade so that you can make enough money to go to school. And not everyone needs to go to college, poor or wealthy, though they might believe they need to at 18.

I DO think there's a difference between being a single mom between jobs, for instance, and being a university student. Going to school is voluntary; no one got laid off. A full-time, typical university student has made the conscious decision NOT to work full-time; that comes with financial consequences that have to be taken into consideration when you make that choice.

That said, I agree that the loans and grants system as it stands is far from perfect! There's got to be a way to make college more affordable. I just don't think using food stamps and the limited capacities of food banks as alternates to government educational grants is the way to do that.

i think everyone has a different situation, and what you're doing is working for you. need-based scholarships and grants don't necessarily do what they say. take me for example. i'm the youngest of four children from a single parent household. my mother is a teacher who put her four kids through college on a teacher's salary (and got her own phD in the process...yes, my mom is basically a saint, but that's another story).

the point is that my oldest sister, the first of the four kids to go to college, got a pell grant and other money she didn't have to reimburse, and by the time i reached college age, the amount of money set aside for members of my family to attend college was far less. not because of me as an individual interested in pursuing higher education, but because that's how it works. as the youngest kid in a family of academically inclined people whose parent didn't make a killer living, i received less aide. not because i needed less, but just because.

of course, i didn't do food stamps because my loans covered my meal card. but, like mvb said, that's probably not always the case anymore.

i get where you're coming from in saying that the unfortunate reality is that education is a commodity. i think that's very, very crappy, but at least partly true. but i reject the notion that poor people shouldn't even bother with college because they're poor and it's expensive. (knowing you personally, i don't think that's what you meant, but i'm throwing it out there.) and just as college isn't for everyone, niether is trade school. i have a sneaking suspicion that, for the folks going to college who need food stamps, they're going to college to defy the notion that trade school is their only option.

education is such an issue of pride and self-awarenes, and college is about way more than what happens in class and what books you read. i think it's different for everyone, and it's kind of impossible to generalize by saying one way of going about that experience is more valid than another. some people in college might just need food stamps. as long as the people using the food stamps actually really need them and aren't just exploiting the system, i have no problem with it. but that goes for people who aren't in college and are on food stamps, too. there are people all over the system who abuse it, and people all over the system who are using it responsibly because they really need it. i don't think it's any different if you're in college, or if you're a single mom between jobs, or if you're a vet or disabled, or whatever.

If you don't have the money for something, or can't get reasonable loans to help out, don't buy it. Higher education, while a nice thing to have, is something you purchase with money; a LOT of money. I agree that's not the fairest way to work it, but that's how it is in the States. It's one thing to come into a university already on food stamps, getting your education financed mostly by government grants and need-based scholarships/loans (that's what those are there for!). It's another thing entirely to lean on a system that's already straining to hold too many people because you have chosen to purchase an expensive education and find yourself unable to make ends meet.

I really don't believe that the best or the only way to get through college is a solid four or five year block, for many people. Some of the most interesting and creative people I know have not gone that route. I don't think that "trade school" is a dirty phrase at all; in fact, I strongly recommend that more college-bound people learn trades before, during, or after college. I don't bring it up as a strict alternative (college OR trade school), but as a way to learn how to make a solid living so that you can afford to go to school, if you want to, without shopping at the food bank.

Because I went to a trade school, I, along with my classmates, have a way to earn a very respectable living for the rest of my life. Now, when I choose to return to school, or *if* I choose, I will be able to qualify for the loans I need and be able to make a living while I finish my degree. That's hardly a disadvantage; in fact, I take pride in being independent and able to pay my own way, and it's a financially smart strategy. I know that I don't deserve college just because I'm intelligent and like reading; I realize that it's a commodity that must be purchased, just like groceries. And if I can't buy groceries, then there's no way in hell I'll be buying 180 credits.

I will also mention that the UW is not the only option for a public higher education, but it is the most expensive in our area. UW Bothell or Tacoma are much cheaper, as are WSU and Eastern.

Honestly, I find myself agreeing more with Kim. I don't think college kids have suddenly gotten too stupid to work for food money or are now too snooty for Top Ramen. What I have noticed is that college tuition has risen incredibly since I went--even at public institutions. Where college loans used to offer a little extra help with a meal card, I suspect they don't anymore--and in any event are less likely to be guaranteed by the gov't at lower interest rates. Yet work-study and minimum wage jobs haven't changed much at all. The disparity is evident. College costs many thousands of dollars more (the UW's tuition has gone up 50% in the last five years), while the federal minimum wage has risen $2.30 since 1991. At that rate, the more time you take off school, the more you effectively pay later. Then, you factor in the recession, the lack of savings, and rising food and fuel costs, and I bet you find that students' parents just don't have that extra few hundred bucks to slip their kids.

yes, and every college town has a hare krishna temple with "community dinners" of tasty free indian food every sunday night.

but, i have to say, for people who are actually in need of food stamps, there's a part of me that cringes at the insistence that, with a little elbow grease, you can get yourself fed. there are plenty of people in this country living in abject poverty and, should they manage to get to college (through grants, scholarships that don't pay for everything but cover enough, or via military service, etc.), they should be encouraged to continue their food stamp programs, or apply for them at all.

i think everyone goes through some semblence of poverty and eating crap and using water over your cereal or ketchup on your pasta in college because you're broke and can't afford good groceries. but i don't personally dig the notion that the alternative to paying for over-priced college is "learning a trade" or "taking time off." indeed, for a lot of people "taking time off college" winds up being "not finishing college," which is more of a bummer than going and living on food stamps while you're there.

not being able to afford college shouldn't mean you have to work as a welder or construction worker, although we need more people to volunteer for those jobs. But people who are academically inclined should just have the opportunity to go there. poverty and education are two really huge hot-button issues for me. i really hope whoever takes over this disaster on january 20, 2009, can find a way to reckon with those two things, because they trickle down to so many other areas where we're lacking.

Excellent strategies! There are so many other ways to make it work. Every campus in the States has at least one club meeting a week offering free pizza, right? Couple that with a food service job (I worked at Noahs, we got half-price bagels and stales if we needed them) and it's possible to survive without going on food stamps. If you're desperate enough to need to visit the food bank, that's when it's time to reassess your financial planning and act accordingly. This whole thing just strikes me as *not okay.*

What happened to Top Ramen?

Or a 10 pound bag of rice and dried beans?

...even with help fromt the folks and work study, these were still key to my survival (fiscal and physical) during college.

I raise a can of expired Dinty Moore's to these enterprising young people!

honestly, the best way to deal with not being able to afford food because you're paying out your nose for exhorbitantly priced higher public education (which, lets face it, should be something everyone has equal access to, regardless of their payscale), is to do like the rest of us did: get a part-time job in food service. or use part of those obnoxious student loans to cover a meal card. your college's cafeteria probably has crappyass food, but that's what it's there for. because students are broke. also, what about work study?