Our preoccupation with incarceration costs us in education

 

By Naivasha Dean, Contributing Columnist

Faced with high unemployment rates and crippling debt, Oregon students are stumbling under the burden of rising tuition costs. On Feb. 21, hundreds of Oregon college students lobbied lawmakers in Salem and gathered on the campuses of Eastern Oregon and Portland State Universities to protest the rising cost of higher education. Annual tuition and fees have doubled over the last decade, and the Legislature’s 2011 hold back of 3.5 percent of the education budget has exacerbated the problem.