While reading Kevin Reilly's Monday guest column supporting a tuition increase, I couldn't help but notice a striking lack of independent thought and analysis.
While his views are certainly warranted - education isn't getting any cheaper, and the main benefactors must bear some of that increased burden - his and the UF administration's reasons for the increase are paper-thin. Under this reasoning, both Reilly and the administration fail to address the root of the problem.
Yes, our economy is bad and state revenues are down, but there is one question that remains to be answered: Why do we always find ourselves in this situation?
Our Mickey Mouse tax revenue system is no longer viable. Although it's nice not to have one of those pesky state income taxes, relying solely on gimmicks like tourism income and the lottery to fund the education of our future only serves its purpose when times are good.
When things start looking bleak, professors, school nurses and educational support staff suddenly become expendable.
Foreign language programs just don't seem to matter much anymore, but thank God we passed the Amendment One real estate tax break, which doles out an average of $250 to most Floridians.
The point is this: Nowhere on campus, among any UF officials, is anyone raising concerns about how poorly education is funded in the state. No one seems to care about our roller-coaster revenue and its effect on our long-term goal of being a flagship research and teaching institution.
UF's president and certainly our Student Body president should be the first to stand up for students and tell our friends in Tallahassee enough is enough. Instead, we see nothing except tuition hikes, tax cuts for those who don't need it and layoffs during economic turmoil.
In this environment, it's no wonder some of our best and brightest faculty are heading for greener pastures with money from states that actually give a damn about education.
Brandon Sack is a biomedical sciences graduate student.
