Carrying signs and chanting, hundreds of UW System students marched from Library Mall to the Capitol Wednesday in protest of proposed tuition raises and funding cuts to the UW System. The march, coordinated by the Associated Students of Madison, presented student demands to state Senators.
Last week the state Assembly passed an 8 percent tuition increase cap for in-state tuition, a 13 percent out-of-state tuition cap and a one-time 10 percent tuition surcharge for out-of-state students. The Senators are beginning to discuss their version of the budget this week.
The proposals are part of $120 million in overall cuts to the UW System.
\This is the worst-case scenario,"" said Jack Zausner, rally attendee and ASM representative, on nonresident tuition appeals. ""When you have a budget deficit and you cut from higher education, that is the worst case.""
The students sought listening sessions, removal of the 10 percent out-of-state surcharge and action to restore and increase financial aid as some of their demands.
According to state Rep. Stephen Nass, R-Whitewater, the current $1.3 billion state deficit necessitated the cuts.
""I don't think [students] have been told the real fiscal crisis that's out there,"" he said. ""We are quite frankly out of money.""
Nass also said last year, while state institutions were cut by 5 percent, the university was spared from cuts and granted roughly $60 million extra.
The depth of the cuts this year was cited by protesters as the concern, however, and not an unwillingness to accept cuts in general.
""Students are not saying that we don't expect to deal with any of the deficit; we don't expect to live in a vacuum,"" said ASM Chair Jessica Miller. ""What we are saying, though, is that $20,000 for a year of school ... $120 million in cuts from the UW System is completely unacceptable. That sends the message that you don't care about students.""
A decrease in diversity will be one detrimental affect of the budget cuts, protesters said.
This situation would result from outpricing nonresident students, a population with a large minority presence on campus, they said.
""I think this university is what it is because it has 35 percent out-of-state students ... it brings diversity,"" Zausner, an out-of-state student, said. ""I wouldn't have come here if I knew they would start raising tuition like this.""
Nass said this claim of lowering diversity lacked substance.
""To say, wherever this is coming from, that we aren't going to have diversity there because of the out-of-state surcharge, that's just a bunch of hokey,"" he said. ""People are just throwing darts blindly and hoping something sticks.""
Dealing with student concerns regarding the level of tuition hikes, Nass points out that the state government does not raise tuition'the regents do'and the numbers passed were just limits.
""If the regents wanted to look in their own funding and say we don't need an 8 percent tuition increase, we are only going to do 4 percent. ... They can do that,"" he said.
Protesters stressed the rally as a way to show that students are not sitting silently while their education is being changed.
""We are watching when they close the doors of education, the whole world is watching,"" Fargen said. ""We need to keep public education public.\
