Student involvement key in reducing education costs

Editor,

In my letter published in Tuesday's Daily Lobo, I stated "I am especially interested in finding ways to reduce the cost of secondary education, encouraging student lobbying in Santa Fe and strengthening the ties between ASUNM, GPSA, Staff Council and Faculty Senate."

I would like to first expand upon reducing the cost of our education. In order to reduce the cost of our education, I would like to take a look at textbooks. This is an essential component of any student-led agenda because it is a problem we are capable of addressing on our own. I believe that student government should hold our departments and faculty accountable for finding and using quality textbooks as long as possible and for multiple classes if possible. Thank you to those who already do this on their own. Believe me, it helps and we notice. Obviously, this will be easier for some subjects than it is for others.

Creating and maintaining an online book exchange is something I feel our student government can and should do. This would allow students to buy, sell or trade textbooks with one another instead of selling them back to the publishing companies who reap exorbitant profits from book buybacks. I believe that, if implemented properly, these two measures could save UNM students a lot of money.

Education costs have been increasing faster than inflation (and the average cost of living) for quite some time. According to a report by the American Council on Education, the primary factors driving tuition increases are the following: states reducing their support, rapid increase of knowledge in the sciences, increasing investments in student aid and programming, costs associated with compliance with federal and state regulations, and the fact that higher education is highly labor-intensive. Productivity gains in the service industry are hard to come by, and, in terms of higher education, mean doing things students don't like such as creating large lectures, hiring assistant professors, etc.

I believe that the best way for students to address these issues is by having a larger role in the management of our university. We know which programs are working, which programs need restructuring and which programs need to be cut. In order to address some of these issues, we need to have a strong voice in the Legislature, and this means lobbying more effectively.

Evan Harris

UNM student