RE: "I Value My Education and So Should You"

          While searching through our class blog roll, I ran across Rohan Adiga’s interesting commentary on the recent funding decreases for Texas’s secondary institutions, particularly the University of Texas at Austin. As a student of UT, and especially one invested in the quality of its faculty, research, and reputation, he expresses particular disappointment in Governor Perry’s recent cuts in funding to the University – policy costing a “whopping” $92 million to UT over the next two years. With such cuts, one would think hikes in tuition could help pick up the slack. However, thanks to the Governor, frozen tuition rates leave the University in a deep hole – a predicament Adiga feels will cost the University the prestige it has worked so hard to achieve. Without the money to fund such groundbreaking research, why should brilliant scientists even think about coming to UT? A great question indeed, Rohan.

          As a fellow science and University of Texas student, I agree with his argument. Rick Perry has continued to champion his conservative ways, preventing tax or tuition increases without providing a means to pick up the slack. This well written commentary provides insight into how such policies will hurt the diverse and innovative researchers of the University of Texas – chemists, psychologists, political scientists, and more that have worked to help put UT on the world map. Though the Governor may champion the University’s success, he can’t realistically expect such groundbreaking (and subsequently expensive) research to continue without the appropriate funding. The cake may be tasty, but who’s going to keep baking it?