Saturday, February 4, 2012

Georgia College Students: "Without Food Stamps We Wouldn't Be Able to Eat"


Pardon me for being so crude, but I simply cannot think of another way to express my feelings here other than to ask the question: how many more ways can we fuck over our young adults in this country? We brainwash the poor kinds into thinking that the MUST have a college education in order to succeed in this society (even as that becomes more of a cruel lie with every passing year), send them to institutions of alleged higher learning which charge them exorbitant fees and then saddle them with massive amounts if student loan debt. And then, when some of them have the audacity to try to help support themselves by applying for food stamps, we cut off that meager support because its "too expensive." Here is a local Georgia television station with the story:
Georgia's college students are facing the prospect of the HOPE Scholarship paying less and less toward their tuition in the next few years.

So how are they dealing with rising tuition and fees?

Many are working whatever part-time jobs they can rustle up, mornings, nights and weekends. But they're also tapping into an unconventional form of student financial aid: food stamps.

The "Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program" is providing college students who qualify with $200 a month toward their groceries, making them part of the 20 percent of Georgia's population currently receiving the benefit.
Here are two students' appalling stories:
"With the budget cuts, students are definitely going to have to think of different ways to get money and finances for things such as groceries," said Danielle Ford, a GSU Junior. "So food stamps will definitely be a big help, absolutely. Without food stamps, they wouldn't be able to eat."

Taylor is a full-time student with a part-time job.

"As a full-time student, my bill usually comes up to about almost $5,000 a semester. That's tuition alone," he said.

On top of that are his books and fees and his rent for an off-campus apartment, which is $600 a month.

One of the reasons he moved out of a campus dorm, Taylor said, is that GSU was requiring him to pay, in addition to his room cost, about $1,700 a semester for the university's meal plan.

Now, living off-campus and buying his own groceries, he understands why students are tapping into the SNAP program.

"I mean, I think it helps," said Taylor, "because these are students that I know that [like me] are working, like, jobs! And they're really tight on money. These are people who actually really, really need it, and they tell me it's a big help."
Alas:
Last year, Michigan cut 30,000 students from its food stamp rolls by tightening up the requirements for approval, in order to save $75 million a year.
Sadly, these kids don't know it but they are learning some hard lessons about the new realities in modern day America. They'd be much better off dropping out of school and joining the Occupy movement than driving themselves ever deeper into debt chasing an American Dream than has long since turned into an epic nightmare.


Bonus: "Here are the young men, the weight on their shoulders...here are the young men, where have they been? We knocked on the doors of hell's darkest chamber...pushed to the limits, we dragged ourselves in"

8 comments:

  1. for some reason,this made me think of the number of times on/off the net that someone suggests that it might be a good idea for society to maybe not have so many children - and then get labelled as being "for eugenics"...

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    1. I'd label your offspring as Islamic converts. Either that or dead. One thing for certain, the western world is showing ever increasing signs of negative population growth while Muslim states continue to produce children in vast numbers. Now before you label me as Islamophobic, do the research, see for yourself.

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    2. Not Islamophobic, just psychotically paranoid; so we have to get them before they get us? And we do this by cramming every square available meter with more people? And using up all the available resources in the process? - That's insane...btw -I got fixed - so,no offspring...

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    3. Thing is, Sabre, most of those countries where they're 'producing children in vast numbers' *already* have problems feeding their population without importing large quantities of food. In a declining energy scenario, all they are really doing is increasing the die-off numbers exponentially...

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  2. Diploma mills that enslave our youth for life utilizing usury. I wish I had become a plumber or a barber instead of going into Information Technology! At least I don't have any student loans :-) I feel sorry for the poor bastards that are climbing aboard *that* treadmill...

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  4. hey Bill, saw your link at the Ozarkers and had to come read this.
    I had no damned idea it was getting so bad for students. What the hell are we thinking?
    you know, getting old is taking some gettin' used to, but, honestly I'm glad i'm not a young person today.

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    1. Isn't that the truth, pamela? Sadly, the overwhelming majority of the "aware" seem to be people like us who are in the second haf of our lives. The young are the most at risk and the most unaware. Alas.

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