SKYE stephenson

Sharing my most recent monthly healing column that discusses how our educational policy choices at a societal level influence our community health and well-being.  Contrasts recent educational policies and reactions in my two homes: the United State and Chile. 

TRYING TO BALANCE A TALE OF TWO COUNTRIES

I am feeling confused.  This is a hard article to write this month, and I considered taking on an easier topic but I truly feel compelled to share with you some unresolved questions I have about my two countries: the United States and Chile.  Yes, this will be about community health, broadly speaking.      

The news from Chile these days is all about the massive protests going on nationally against the government attempts to further privatize higher education.  For several months, large numbers of students, teachers, concerned citizens and, yes, even university rectors have taken to the streets throughout the country in criticism of the Piñera administration’s goal of expanding private for-profit universities and decreasing government support for higher education.  Some universities have been shut down for days and weeks; even some high schools and junior high schools too.

 I first went to Chile in the 1980s to do my doctoral research on higher education policy in that amazing Andean nation, and ended up living there for more than a decade, becoming a de facto permanent resident.  In the years since I have returned to theUS, I have continued to stay in touch with Chile and usually visit at least once every year. 

This background is to explain that these protests were not a total surprise for me.  I was most recently in Chile in May of this year helping to lead a delegation of USNH educators looking to develop and solidify relations with Chilean universities.  So we were in the thick of things, hearing from Chilean educators and policymakers their concerns about the increasing “corporatization” of universities. 

Vicente, one of my son’s friends from elementary school in Santiago, was protesting along with many of his high school buddies.  Vicente’s mother, a friend of mine, was proud of her son, although a bit worried about the tear gas possibility.  Many of the young people were most concerned about the increasing tuition costs of university education in Chile and how this was keeping people from the lower socio-economic class from being able to obtain a university degree.  Their vision was that access to higher education is a key to narrowing class differences and income differentials, an important goal for their society. 

Flash forward to my return toKeene, where I work at Keene State College.  During the few weeks I was inChile, the state government of New Hampshirecut appropriations to the College by over 48%.  Already the state with the lowest level of government support for higher education, New Hampshirecould not fall any farther than #50 in the ranking of state expenditure for universities. 

Add to this dramatic cut the elimination of the Ace grant program, which until this year provided grants to in-state students of the lower socio-economic sectors to help fund at least a portion of their tuition.  Now, New Hampshire is the only state in the nation without such a program. 

At the same time, the New Hampshire legislature funded a scholarship program for students attending private universities in New Hampshire.

All this happened pretty quietly and without much protest here in the Granite State. 

The protests are still going on in Chile, even though the Education Minister resigned.  People consider public higher education a “good” good.

The academic year is about to start at Keene State College.  Clearly the people with the political power these days inConcorddon’t seem to think that there is much that is good about public higher education.  At least they sure don’t want to fund it.

It’s hard for me not to contrast my two countries these days.  And this is where the community health part comes in.  I can’t help but wonder which attitude and policy is “healthier” from a societal standpoint?