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Tuesday, September 4, 2012 - 3C


ALDEN REISS/Daily ERIN KIRKL
President Barack Obama address a crowd of 4,000 at Al Glick Field House on Friday. University officials and campus leaders wave as President Barack Obama takes the stage.
Obama advocates for financial aid

4,000 pack Al Glick
Field House on
Friday
By BETHANY BIRON and
JOSEPH LICHTERMAN
ManagingNews Editor and
Editor mo Chief-
Speaking before a bleary-
eyed capacity crowd of 4,000
who waited in the wee hours of
the morning Friday to secure
a prime spot, President Barack
Obama stressed the importance
of higher education by announc-
ing a handful of new proposals to
combat student debt.
During his address at Al
Glick Field Htuse, the Michigan
football team's indoor practice
facility, Obama unveiled a plan
that would allocate $10 billion
in fe'deral aid each year to col-
leges and universities that limit
tuition increases. Ann Arbor was
Obama's last stop on a three-day,
five-state, trip following his State
of the Union address on Tuesday."
"We are putting colleges on
notice you can't keep - you
can't assume that you'll just jack

up tuition every single year,"
Obama said. "If you can't stop
tuition from going up, then the
funding you get from taxpayers
each year will go down."
Obama also proposed a $1 bil-
lion Race to the Top program
that chould award funding to
states that make an effort to con-
tinue to fund higher education
and limit tuition hikes.
"We're telling the states, if
you can find new ways to bring
down the cost of college and
make it easier for more students
to graduate, we'll help you do it,"
Obama said. "We will give you
additional federal support if you
are doing a good job of making
sure that all of you aren't loaded
up with debt when you graduate
from college."
In an interview with The
Michigan Daily, Secretary of
Education Arne Duncan said
the administration is working to
make more resources available
to students. The president's stu-
dent aid reforms would mostly
increase the amount of need-
based Perkins Loans available to
low-income students.
"We can't do it by ourselves,"
Duncan said. "So we're going to

try to put out a$1billiontaxincen-
tive to states and to colleges to do
the right thing. We're challenging
states to continue to invest even in
tough times and we're challeng-
ing universities to do two things
- keep tuition rates down and
increase graduation rates."
Obama put pressure on Con-
gress to make the American
Opportunity Tax Credit - which
provides college students with up
to $10,000 over four years - per-
manent, and to double the number
of federal work study jobs avail-
able to students.
The Obama administration
will also boost its efforts to make
financial. aid information more
accessible for families by creating
several online tools that provide
comprehensive information about
what types of aid institutions
offer.
"From now on, parents and
students deserve to know how
a college is doing - how afford-
able is it, how well are its students
doing," Obama said. "We want you
to know how well a car stacks up
before you buy it. You should know
how well a college stacks up."
Speaking under an array of
Big Ten championship banners

and atop a platform placed upon
a block 'M' on the indoor field,
Obama also congratulated the
football team on its Sugar Bowl
win, calling the team "a force to
be reckoned with" under junior
quarterback Denard Robinson,
who was sitting among congress-
men and state officials during
the speech.
In an interview with The
Michigan . Daily before the
speech, Robinson said he was
impressed with the amount of
student support.
"It's great to see President
Obama, I couldn't miss it," Robin-
son said. "A lot of people came out
and came to support him."'
After the speech, University
President Mary Sue Coleman
lauded Obama's attention to the
need for the federal government
to collaborate with universities
around the nation in an effort
to develop efficient policies
that minimize student debt and

increase accessibility.
"College affordability is
extraordinarily important for all
of us and I was so pleased that he
recognizes the complexity - the
fact that the state has a role, the
federal government has a role,
universities have a role - and
all of them have to be working
together to make this possible,"
Coleman said.
Coleman stressed the need for
the state to continue to invest in
higher education, particularly
following years of repeated cuts
in funding alocation to public
colleges within the state, includ-
ing a 15-percent reduction in
funding in 2011 under Republi-
can Gov. Rick Snyder.
"One of the things that
(Obama) did point out very
clearly was the dramatic disin-
vestment that the states have
made, and one of the most harsh
has been in Michigan," Coleman
said. "We have suffered from

that, and we've done a good job
of cutting costs, we've continued
to try to cut costs but we have
to have a reinvestment by the
state."
Coleman added that achiev-
ing the goal of effectively work-
ing among universities, state
governments and the federal
government to increase college
affordability is going to be chal-
lenging, but an endeavor she is
optimistic about for the future.
"I think universities should be
challenged to find more efficient
ways to save money, and we've
been doing that aggressively at
Michigan for the past 10 years
and I have no problem finding
ways," Coleman said "... And
we're unwilling to lower quality,
because I think what the presi-
dent said that is important, is that
we have the best higher educa-
tion system in the world. And we
do not want to lose that, quality
matters.

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