We are writing in response to your Jan. 28 editorial, “Second chance: Admins should listen to students when spending reallocated $800K.” The editorial makes the case that general fee money originally set aside for the new multipurpose center, but now freed up by a delay in the center’s construction plans, should be reallocated based on student input. The editorial also details the dishonest and undemocratic process by which student money was taken for the multipurpose center in the first place.
We agree wholeheartedly with the editorial. But we would like to take it a step further, and demand that all money that comes from students be spent democratically. Unfortunately, the corruption and controversy surrounding the multipurpose center is not the exception, but the rule.
According to Ohio University’s 2012–13 budget, student tuition and fees account for 44.34 percent of the university’s budget, while government support makes up less than 30 percent of the budget. Yet students have no representation on the Board of Trustees, which decides not only how much money students pay, but also how that money is spent. Our two student trustees are outnumbered, unelected and have no voting power.
In fact, they claim not to be representatives of the student body, but instead the taxpayers. This prompts the question: if even our student trustees do not represent student interests on the board, who does? Who defends the interests of the biggest group in the university — the group upon whose dollar the university is built and for whose benefit it is supposedly run? We reluctantly conclude that no one does. Students have been banned from contacting board members directly!
The results are disastrous. Last year, the board unanimously voted to raise tuition by the maximum legal amount, even in the face of strong student opposition. Then, despite the apocalyptic alternative they had advanced when attempting to justify the tuition hike, they turned around and gave a full 10 percent of the hike to the ten highest-paid administrators in the form of raises and bonuses.
And this happened even though women at Ohio University are literally turning to prostitution to try to pay tuition — at a faster rate than all but a handful of universities worldwide! It happened even though 40 percent of students say there is at least “some chance” that they will have to drop out if tuition continues to rise! Such a ludicrous decision never would have been made if students were allowed to represent their own interests.
The board’s persistent refusal to share its power with students is outrageous, and it must be stopped. We are fighting for transparency, democracy and affordability in public higher education. We encourage students to get involved by attending meetings, liking “Ohio University Student Union” on Facebook and following @OHStudentPower on Twitter. Power over our own resources is not going to be handed to us; we have to fight for it together.
The Ohio University Student Union meets Thursdays at 8 p.m. in Baker 231.
