from yesterday 3

“The Curious Incident of the Apathy at the College”

In April 2012, a group of college students in Santa Monica – protesting a new plan to sell courses to those who could afford to pay several times the standard amount for “high demand” classes – got pepper sprayed in what turned out to be a don't-just-sit-there-and-let-this-happen story about standing up for what you believe in. A bit further down the shoreline at Orange Coast College in Costa Mesa, I had mentioned in class (quite angrily) that I didn't agree with Governor Jerry Brown's plan to raise community college tuition from $36 to $46 per credit hour. As I finished my somewhat outspoken oration I noticed that the looks I had earned were those of bewilderment mixed with disbelief and sprinkled with apathy. The rest of the class was busy updating their Facebook pages and replying to texts that were assuredly important. It was at this very moment that I could no longer support the cause to fight for what I thought had been unfairly high tuition fees implemented by the community college system and its administrators. After I started to think about it, finding out that community college students were turds was like finding out there was smog in Los Angeles – no kidding.

In December of 2009 a California Community Colleges Chancellor named Jack Scott, told a room full of people (who live in mansions away from the problems of the poor) that cuts in school's budgets had increased class sizes while making it harder for students to actually get into the classes they needed in order to graduate on time. My daily experiences almost agreed with that. The part that ol' Jack left out was the part where students – after fighting harder than Mexicans trying to get across the border – settled into the American way of apathy and complacency. The part where the girl behind me in math couldn't go more than three minutes without sending or replying to a text message. The part where the masses of turds who couldn't make it to an 11AM class on time managed to leave 20 minutes early despite the class being only an hour and a half in length. The part where every kid with a shiny new Macbook was constantly updating a meaningless Facebook existence instead of paying attention to their instructors in the very classes they tried so hard to get into. I wanted to get behind the agenda to keep tuition fees down, but my motivation swirled down the drain like the sleeping guy with the headphones' interest in learning surely swirled down the drain that morning after taking a painful piss made up of the weekend's remaining regrets.

Before I was willing to dine on pepper spray at the next meeting of the administration I had to wonder if tuition was actually that bad here in California. What I found out was that California Community Colleges have one of the lowest enrollment fees in the United States. Even after the governors new tuition increases take effect this summer, California will still have one of the lowest enrollment fees in all of America. If you don't like paying $46 dollars per credit hour then you can always try one of the following challengers' schools : North Carolina weighs in at around $57, New York comes in at about $150, and Vermont tips the scales at a hefty $223 dollars per credit hour for in-state tuition. Eat that protesters.

Something I did find strange was how the word “rights” had been thrown around so loosely by students when they feared having to tell their parents that it would soon cost them more money to see their children fail and drop classes repeatedly. There was an almost smug sense of deserving the world for their meager contributions to the local street pharmacist's economic betterment. I felt like Mark Twain when he said, “ Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.” Except I was more enraged.

Something about spending someone else's money to take a class (up until the first midterm) only to drop it and sufficiently screw everyone else that needed that class to graduate on time changed my opinion of student protesters. The problem is you. The problem is not the administration. The problem is not the governor. The problem is not some other entity that I'm sure you can place the blame on if need be. Until you are willing to do the following: put down the phones, pay attention in class, wake up, be on time, my eyes will remain free of pepper spray as I surpass students that just couldn't make it into the classes they feel they deserved so much. I am awake; my phone is off.

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