Take up your rakes

Wildcat File Photo Arizona Daily Wildcat Scott Andrew Schulz

Better yet, maybe President Peter Likins could hire a bunch of us to do some landscaping on his property. That way, while he's inside, stuffing himself silly with a nicely roasted turkey, we can earn enough money to pay the extra $100 required of Arizona residents. I suppose those of us who come from outside Arizona will need to come back around Christmas time, seeing as how we owe another $300 dollars a year.

Oh, but this is only the beginning. Three or four years from now you will be begging for the chance to rake leaves off of Likins' lawn. Tuition has jumped considerably in the past two years, equivalent to about $600 for out-of-state students. It has not been pretty for residents either. If we continue at the current pace we are on, just imagine how much tuition will cost at the UA in the near future.

Should you believe Likins is done raising the cost of your education, smack yourself. He said himself that he plans to "grow the tuition over a five- to 10 year period to meet the market until it was one-third or one-fourth from the bottom (of the national ranking)."

All right, you say, that does not sound so bad. But then you remember that Likins declared the UA is "a bargain at $5,000 or $6,000 or even $8,000 a year."

If you think next year's price tag of $2,259 is nasty, multiply that four times. Better hope Likins has an incredible number of leaves on his lawn.

Yet missing out on the opportunity to add another hole to your belt this Thanksgiving is not the saddest result of the unnecessary hike in tuition costs. What is worse is the realization that our administrative leaders care nothing about the students of this institution.

When a public hearing was organized to discuss the proposed increase in tuition, we showed the administration a reasonable turnout. While there certainly could have been more, there were enough of us there to explain the financial struggles of the majority of students.

Unfortunately, it is now evident that the hearing was simply for show and nothing more. Many of us stared directly into the eyes of Regent John Munger and President Likins, pleading for them to understand that, unlike each of them, we do not take home six-figure incomes. For Munger and Likins, a $300 yearly increase in costs could be attributed to a rise in country club dues and mean a couple of overtime hours. For us, it means having to count inventory at a supermarket on Christmas morning. But they did not care.

The tuition debate gave the UA administration the opportunity to prove that it gave a damn about the livelihood of its students. By standing up and saying that it preferred not to needlessly bleed the student body dry, the administration would have taken a giant step toward repairing an increasingly frayed relationship with the students it represents. Instead, we are left feeling like a blood drive is sweeping through campus again. Only this time, none of us receive T-shirts.

We could protest day and night and still there would be no change. Why the Associated Students even exists is anyone's guess. Likins does not listen to the ASUA anyway. Think of how much money we could save by ridding ourselves of this organization whose main accomplishments this year are the censorship of a comic strip writer and the condemnation of the Wildcat for revealing the identity of our mascot. As much as I would love to blame ASUA President Tara Taylor for the inability of the ASUA to accomplish anything significant, I believe now that you could put anyone in her position and the results would be much the same. When the UA president has his own agenda, he fails to listen to the concerns of those he represents. Thus, the ASUA has become nothing more than a powerless group of invisible representatives.

I urge you not to attend the next public hearing held by the UA administration, whenever that might occur. We will benefit just as much from a meeting no one attends as we will from a discussion where all 35,000 of us speak against ridiculous increases in fees. I am afraid I, too, have joined the ranks of the apathetic. What a difference a week makes.

So for those of you lucky enough to have your parents foot the bill for college, have fun explaining to Mom and Dad tomorrow that you will need at least another $100 from them next year. For the rest of you, I plan on seeing you tomorrow morning. Don't forget your rake.

Scott Andrew Schulz is a communication junior can be reached via e-mail at Scott.Andrew.Schulz@wildcat.arizona.edu. His column, Millstone, appears every Wednesday.