Some students get up to brilliant antics! University of Colorado student Nic Ramos wanted to send "an eye-grabbing message about the rising cost of tuition" according to TheDenverChannel.com news story - Heavy Price: CU Student Pays $14K Tuition In $1 Bills. The cash weighed 33 lbs which took him a long time to gather from various banks. Here's a YouTube video featuring Ramos and his story:
This beats the more traditional demonstrating on the streets, which I did in the early 1980s behind Joe Duffy - "Freeze the Fees" we shouted outside the Dáil, but no one was listening. Expect to see more of this type of protest. Fees have risen dramatically in the UK, and sadly both our existing and future governments are broke, and may need to increase the cost of education to students (and their parents). The current Finance Bill seeks also to abolish tax relief on fees for part-time students - this has quietly been added to the Bill in the past few days, and may hurt Colleges with a lot of part-time students, such as NCI, severely.
The cost of education rivals only the health and social welfare budgets here - Ireland spends vast quantities of euro on education. To cut this back makes no sense - but to save education means more severe cutbacks elsewhere. If fees are reintroduced - we need to ensure that it is more than a cost saving measure, and that a better education system is provided. Do less with more if we have to. I just hope that education is not used as a political football in the election, and that the new Minister for Education is not some jaded politician who got a lot of votes and brought in a running mate in the back of beyond.
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