The House and the Senate released their proposed budgets for this session. With Washington’s 2.8 billion dollar deficit, we expected cuts. What did grandpa used to say after all? oh that’s right, “money doesn’t grow on trees.”

Thanks, grandpa.

Here are a few lowlights from the budget cuts, but if you want to read about all the education programs that have been reduced or cut, check out this one here.

Proposed cuts from the House budget would:

-Reduce work study programs by 7.7 million dollars
-Eliminate Navigation 101, money that goes towards career and college counseling services for students in 6^th-12^th grade
-Prohibit any more spending on state need grants (current recipients still get their funds, but nobody new next year)

Proposed cuts from the Senate budget would:

-Reduce work study programs by 7.4 million dollars
-Take away 103 million dollars from Kindergarten through 4^th grade classrooms, meaning bigger class sizes and fewer teachers
-Cut college campuses across the state by 6%– regardless of whether they are a 2 year or 4 year campus. This will create disproportionate affects for our State’s higher education institutions

Money may not grow on trees, but we can definitely do something about these missing dollars. We can generate new statewide revenue. Both the House and Senate budgets proposed ways to close tax loopholes and increase minor sales taxes, but it won’t be nearly enough to fill the gaps.

Jim Dawson of Fuse puts it plainly, “you’re looking at about $4 in cuts to every $1 in new revenue sources. The package is not big enough.”

Click here to find and tell your legislators to protect funding for these critical programs.

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The Huffington Post recently launched a new blog section dedicated to college campuses and the hot-button issues young people are facing all across the nation. This immediately feels right for many, many reasons.

Primary reason, the big story this week is titled, “Majoring in Debt” and highlights the stories of young people all across the US who are swimming in student loans. Some people are pissed, some shrug their shoulders, but most have discovered that despite making the sacrifice to get themselves to school—the options post-degree are less than fulfilling. Competitive and limited job market (thanks recession), intense payment plans, and a big dose of “trapped by debt” are the prevailing sentiments here.

Students nationwide have borrowed $527 billion to go to school this year and have one student pondering “where’s our bailout?!” Excellent question, Todd. Excellent question.

Among other reasons why this new college section of Huffington Post feels right:

This site has some hilarious articles and I think we could all stand to laugh a little more.

Young people are the cultural pulse of our nation? What? It’s true. Not only can we tell you what’s hot right now, but our mastery of optimism AND cynicism makes it pretty easy to predict the future.

Example: I could imagine that in my lifetime this country will see a comprehensive, universal health care system and we will somehow develop a worldwide plan to end poverty. Then again, it won’t matter because the world will probably end in 2012. You know, apocalypse.

That leaves a LOT of room for something between those two extremes to happen. When it does, I will take credit for being partially right. Boom, future predicted. Now if I could only knock out that debt…

Here are some WWU students Majoring in Debt too:

There’s more on our Flickr

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John, a senior at Skyline High School in Sammamish

On Monday, LEV took a whole busload of students from around the state down to our state’s capital for a crash course in education advocacy.

Aside from free t-shirts and pizza (a good thing on any day), we also had the opportunity to get together with other students from their legislative districts and brainstorm some message points to deliver to our legislators. We even took part in the gargantuan Rally for Our Future on the steps of the Capitol building, along with 4,000 other like-minded students and citizens, and heard the personal stories of people from all over the state who demonstrated the need for new revenue and the ramifications of cutting funding for education and human services.

Maria and Jesus, who attend Health Sciences and Human Services High School in White Center, rallied to protect funding for kids, schools and human services.

The day culminated in an EPIC scavenger hunt around the capitol, where the student-advocates delivered their notes to their legislators, busted out dance moves on the floor of the rotunda in the Legislative Building, and had the opportunity to sit in on the debates on the House and Senate floors.

Parents brought their kids to Olympia to remind legislators who are impacted by state budget cuts.

It was pretty incredible to be able to see some of the inner cogs and gears of our government (supposedly) working hard on…something. It was also a pretty venue for students to express their opinions on the issues.

Jesus Robles, a junior at Health Sciences and Human Services High School in White Center, was one of a handful of students who stated their beef directly in a video testimony: “My favorite part was being interviewed over the issues in my school and sending the letters to the representatives and senators,” he says.

All in all, LEV gave over 40 students the opportunity to take a direct role in their government and gain some experience in working directly with their representatives.

We met with Sen. Margarita Prentice's legislative aide, Beau Perschbacher, to talk about how budget cuts could impact their schools.

“It was really exciting to express our concerns to the people who are making the decisions,” says Bill Dow, a freshman at the University of Washington, who had the opportunity to sit down with an aide from his state Senator’s office. He adds, “And I want to get marble installed in my dorm room.” (Marble is a pretty constant feature at the capitol-and yes, that includes the bathrooms.)

Experiences like this demonstrate the ease with which concerned students and constituents can see first-hand how their state is being governed, and convey their concerns to their representatives. It was a first time for me, and I was amazed at how we could simply walk into the offices of our representatives and senators and deliver them a note with our views, or pull them out of the chamber to talk with them directly. I mean, how cool is that?!

The answer, of course, is very, very cool.

We left Olympia with a better understanding of how our state is governed and how easy it is to convey our concerns to our elected officials.

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If you missed this opinion editorial last Friday in the Tacoma News Tribune by President Ronald Thomas (University of Puget Sound) and President Loren Anderson (Pacific Lutheran University), check it out now!

Included in this piece is the answer to why Washington, even though we’re facing a 2.6 billion dollar deficit this session, can’t afford to cut need-based grants and work study programs.

Wait a second—everybody out there—I’m pretty sure young people have been saying this since day one? Shout out to university presidents for having our back!

What makes this opinion piece so compelling is that it frames this discussion of college affordability as an issue that impacts everyone, “What our legislators decide will affect not only these students, but ultimately the future prosperity of our state. It will affect us all.”

Presidents Thomas and Anderson also opted for a timeless sports metaphor in describing how state work-study programs benefit all of society, by naming the program “a true triple play.” It helps students make some extra income, it helps universities by filling necessary positions, and it benefits local businesses because students graduate with a lil something on their resume (making them more employable). Heck yes.

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Yes it can!

On Saturday, over 100 students and volunteers showed up at the Boathouse at Greenlake to rally for the renewal of Propositions 1 & 2 (the school levies!) These are funds that make-up 23% of the Seattle School district’s operating budget. We’re talking stuff like basic building maintenance and technology upgrades, as well as teacher salaries! Without these levies, the school district would not be able to fund a 6^th period in the school day. Whew, big deal.

Below are a few pictures from young voters in action:

One volunteer and UW student, Rocio Woods, would like to remind us all that this year’s all mail-in election comes at a slight cost to the voters: 44 cents!

“Apathy can undermine our best intentions to ensure that Seattle Public Schools receive the funds that they need for their daily operations and capital expenditures. That’s if we don’t pick up the necessary postage to get our ballots in!”

UW students volunteering on the levy campaign are taking steps to ensure that apathy doesn’t get the best of us—they are passing out stamps on campus. Here they are below phone banking at campaign headquarters:

Don’t forget: tomorrow (Feb. 9^th) is the LAST day to post-mark your ballot for it to count! Your public schools need your support!

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Because League of Education Voters is celebrating and honoring democracy in a very serious way. We’re participating in it (whoooaa).  Instead of spending your first Monday of mid-winter break sleeping in and having breakfast in bed (orange juice toast to our past presidents)… you should come to Olympia with us for an action-packed day of democracy.

We’ll be meeting up in Olympia with our friends at the Children’s Alliance for:

• Advocacy and Activism 101
• identifying the issues (i.e. why you should care!)
• lunch
• RALLY AT THE CAPITOL
• and then an Epic Photo Scavenger Hunt.

Oh what, you haven’t heard about the rally yet? Well, it’s going to be pretty big. Children’s Alliance will be in the house, LEV will be in the house, the Bus, Young Democrats, Washington Student Association, Fuse, the Win-Win network… All in the house.

We’re all gathering in support of Washington State bringing in some new revenue this year. You know why? Because Washington’s broke and that means they are cutting funding to our education system. While we’re fighting to keep those cuts to a minimum, we’re also fighting to make sure Washington is getting creative with how they bring in the dough (because we need to do both!)

See, democracy can be fun. Free scenic bus tour down the I-5 corridor, free lunch, a giant rally on the steps of the capitol, and a photo scavenger hunt?

You may also learn a lil bit about the state you live in… (not a guarantee though, the learning curve is different for everyone!!)

send me an email (Maggie@educationvoters.org) if you are interested. I’ll put your name on the list, we’ll let you on the bus and get you some grub.

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Want to know what students can do to help the Seattle school levies? Well, here’s what we’ve been doing! Several students have given short presentations at a couple different community events this past week to let people know that passing the levy is important to us! We had the ears of the good people at the 46th Legislative District Democrats on January 21^st, presentations to local preschools, at school community meetings and one student is reaching out to the Kenyan Community here in Seattle. A few of us have been volunteering hours from the campaign headquarters by working on translating some of the levy literature into Somali and Spanish.

We’ve also been going behind the scenes with our very own camera team, covering the events where the levy is being highlighted. Our Communications Specialists have been keeping their fingers in motion as well, contacting newspapers and community papers to keep the levies on the forefront of everyone’s mind.

And then there’s phone banking! Nope that’s not where you deposit your phone for safekeeping – it’s all about putting your cell phones to good use! Students have come into the Schools First Headquarters (on 524 Dexter Avenue, N. in Seattle) and joined up with community organizations around the city reminding people that their votes matters! We may have also shown up for the free PIZZA! More phone banks are scheduled so if you want to join in on all the fun send us an e-mail to let us know when you can make it (and how many slices they should plan for)!

The last bit of big news is that Schools First is having a rally! This Saturday (the 6^th) from 12:00 to 1:00pm at Green Lake Boathouse (5900 West Green Lake Way N). Students (as we speak) are hard at work on getting this event planned and off the ground. Come join us and be a part of this student-led rally to get out the vote to renew Seattle’s levies!

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