CSU Budget Cuts Hurt our Future

CSU Budget cuts greatly affect the current and incoming students attending a CSU.  Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s 2009/2010 budget proposes increasing cuts to the CSU’s already decreased budget.  On top of the $97.6 million mid year cuts the CSU budget will be looking at an additional $66.3 million in cuts for the 2009/2010 school year. The governor’s budget assumes a 10 percent increase for student fees and tuition.  With tuition and student fees on the rise it makes it difficult for some people to afford the CSU education that they are seeking out.  With financial aid and grants also being cut, the student fee increase will only hurt the opportunities for students.  Some students are struggling with going to school full time and working full time just trying to make it in their life.  They are striving to achieve a higher education and obtain a degree to make their future better.  However with so many cuts not only in education but also in the work force many students are feeling very depreciated.  We as students see ourselves as the future.  The future in education, the future in the work force and the future in the community.  Students feel that education is something that should be a high priority to gaining the funds that we need. 

With the cutting of faculty and classroom sections it is becoming more and more difficult for students to get the classes that they require in their field of study.  These classroom cuts hurt students by making the length of graduating longer just because there is not enough room in a given class that a student requires.  If you are unable to register on time for a class that you need it can basically set you back an entire quarter or semester for graduation.  Adding on the first day of classes is becoming something of the past.  In the past couple of quarters the attendance for the first day has been the most that I have seen in my past couple of years at Cal State L.A.  Which is not necessarily a good thing when you look at the severity of it all.  Students are realizing that this situation is very serious and are making sure that they are in the class they need.  Unfortunately those students trying to add a class they need and are unsuccessful have no option but to wait and try their luck next quarter/semester.

Budget cuts also affect graduating students.  I know of students who have graduated from a CSU and other colleges and universities with their degrees and were ready to go out into the work force.  However with the economy and state budget being the way that it is many of these students are unable to obtain good and stable jobs.  I feel that Governor Schwarzenegger does not realize how greatly the education budget cuts affects the future of the state.  Students will become aggravated with the way we are being treated and basically tossed to the side and being unappreciated. 

Bias on Campus

We are judged on how much we know and how we perceive something by the results of the tests we take. It is true that for the most part the results of the tests do go hand in hand with the person's knowledge or preference of the given field of relevance. But there will be cases in which the provided results can be inaccurate, or even the opposite. Tests such as implicit association tests (IAT), test a person's preference between two subjects can have varying results.

I have taken the IAT on "Age" and the results do not reflect my true preference. The IAT on age resulted in "Your data suggests a strong automatic preference for Young compared to Old". This test trained the user to associate both words and pictures to either "young" or "old". It was measured by the speed that the user presses the associated keys to give an end result. If the user is too slow, it would reset and have them complete it again, but faster. I learned that they measure it by speed because from how fast we associate a word or picture to a subject, the stronger of a bias we have towards the subject. The results I received seem to be too bias towards the young, although I am quite neutral as to which side of age I prefer.

On campus, my friends are generally around my age, but that is because in my classes, the students are around my age range. If there are older students in the class, I do try to befriend them as they are able to offer a wider range of knowledge based on their experiences.

Although I am just one person, there will be others with results from IAT's that might not reflect how they are. For the most part, the results obtained from IAT's will reflect the person's bias towards one subject over the other. Even without taking such tests, by watching others, people can make generalized assumptions as to how people have a preference for one thing over the other. They can do so without having to take IAT's and can most likely assume correctly from the people the person is around with.