Editorial: Thanks, but Pell Grants aren’t enough

Hooray?

When Congress indeed approves the last-minute budget compromise it hammered out last… Hooray?

When Congress indeed approves the last-minute budget compromise it hammered out last Friday night, then perhaps we can put aside some of our fears, at least for now. If you picked up the The Pitt News in February, then you might remember our lamenting over the House Republicans’ plan to cut the maximum Pell Grant by $845 in their 2011 budget bill. The good news is in — Friday’s legislation maintained the maximum Pell Grant at its 2010 level, or $5,550 over an academic year. Good thing we spoke up.

According to the Pitt Fact Book, Pitt students got $22.2 million in Pell Grants last year alone. In all, 10 million students studying at American institutions receive Pell Grants, need-based moneys from the U.S. Department of Education aimed to make college more affordable for low-income students.

If the Pell survives today’s voting session, it marks a clear and laudable victory for Team Obama, which fought for Pell Grants earlier this year. It’s a victory that deserves praise even as President Barack Obama’s other education priorities — like funding for the National Institutes of Health or National Science Foundation — have lost ground.

But it’s too early to pop champagne in the Oval Office. And it’s not just because Congress is preparing to war with itself over yet another budget — yes, as much as we’d like to ignore it, the 2012 fiscal year begins on Oct. 1.

No matter how many years Obama extends programs like Pell at fixed levels, the central problem remains untouched — college costs and the resulting debts are skyrocketing, year after year. The Pell Grant might be saved, but college affordability is not.

Reality check: Students of American education are riddled with debt, unable to pay it off and frustrated with an unyielding job market.

Fastweb.com, a website that helps students find financial aid, reports that overall student loan debt in 2010 not only surpassed $800 billion, but it also surpassed what once was the primary worry among college students, credit card debt. The average 2008 graduate left campus with $27,000 in loans to pay off.

Student debt like this, at least in principle, isn’t the worst — after all, more students should approach college as the investment that it is. But such philosophizing becomes irrelevant when you look at some more numbers: At the end of 2009, according to the Department of Education, $50.8 billion of loans were in default. In addition, a study from the Institute for Higher Education Policy recently found that two out of five student borrowers become delinquent after beginning to repay loans.

As well, The New York Times reported last month that the unemployment rate among college graduates under 25 years old has risen to 11.2 percent, 2.2 percent higher than the national average.

While we hope the Pell Grant extensions remain in place as budgetary votes are cast on Capitol Hill today, we’re not getting giddy just yet. Congress still seems to be ignoring the primary problem that make Pell Grants necessary — exorbitant college costs. Maybe, when legislators convince schools to drop their fees, we’ll actually congratulate our legislators.