Don Surber: A Promise for West Virginia's future
Saturday August 18, 2007
In a Daily Mail column last week, economist Matt Ryan reported that the state now ranks 29th in the nation of young adults in or entering college. That is up from 49th place in 2000.
Wow. What could have possibly propelled the state to move up so quickly?
Two words: Promise scholarships. The state now picks up the tab for tuition for any student who graduates from high school with at least a B average and scores high enough on the entrance exams.
The program is simple. It selects the students who are most likely to finish college and gives them free tuition in college.
This is so unlike the state's Higher Education grants, which give money to students not based on the likelihood of their success in college, but rather on their income. The grants are a welfare program. The grants are far less successful than Promise has proved to be.
Higher Education grants have been around for decades. They failed to move us out of 49th place.
But Promise scholarships began in 2002, and already we're No. 29 in percentage of kids in college.
Promise works because it is a merit program. Higher Education grants fail because they are an entitlement. The minimum grade point average is 2.0 for the latter.
Students who are that lacking in either skill or interest in school have no business being in college.
Let them work for a few years. Then they will either be motivated for college, or not.
The state should concentrate its aid on its many deserving high school graduates. Every year, the politicians try to rip Promise off in the name of "saving" money.
May I remind people that the Promise program was used as an excuse to legalize video slot machines on every corner?
You want to save money? Cut legislative pay.
The one lever the politicians use to "save" money is by "raising the standards" on Promise scholarships.
It is a game. Every year, politicians raise the minimum score required on the entrance exams.
And this year, students defied them by meeting the higher standard.
Daily Mail reporter Jessica Karmasek reported in June that even after the bar was raised, more students in Kanawha and Putnam counties qualified for Promise scholarships.
The numbers in Kanawha County rose from 372 in 2006 to 412 in 2007. Likewise, Putnam County's numbers rose from 152 in 2006 to 164 in 2007.
As Nelson Muntz says on "The Simpsons" show: "Ha, ha."
I live for the day when each and every high school senior in West Virginia qualifies for a Promise scholarship.
From what little I have observed, the Promise scholarships help high schools by giving kids an incentive to study hard and to stay out of trouble.
My kids are beyond their Promise scholarship years. But I will defend this program because it shows for the first time that West Virginia is serious about education.
To be sure, funding for education has always been there. West Virginia is second only to Vermont in percentage of taxable income that goes to the public schools. Being 49th in income and beating the national average in spending per student is quite an achievement.
That is the result of good lobbying by teachers unions.
Don't get me wrong. Teachers are the people who educate the kids. But you have to motivate those kids. You have to reward them.
I cannot promise that this program will help turn the state's economy around. But it cannot hurt.
One final thought: A Mormon is suing to get an exemption so he can take a year or two off for missionary work. Well, he certainly is free to do so, but when he comes back home, he should forget about that Promise scholarship.
I hope the courts politely and firmly remind him that it is his choice. The Promise scholarship is for one year at a time. If a person misses a year, he is out.
The Promise program is a reward, not an entitlement. That is the secret to its success.
Now to see if all those extra kids in college do the state any good.
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