OUR VIEWS Consensus Opinion

Political maneuvers

The HOPE Scholarship is once again being used as political pawn in the Georgia state legislature. Governor Sonny Perdue (Rep.) and Lt. Governor Mark Taylor (Dem.) have both proposed amendments to the highly popular scholarship program. Perdue’s “HOPE Chest amendment” aims to limit the spending of lottery funds exclusively to HOPE and the state’s pre-kindergarten programs, while Taylor’s proposal calls for voter approval before any cuts are made to the program.

Though these bills are likely to contain political motivations, the politicians’ proposals are rooted in issues that are very pertinent to the scholarship.

According to the AJC, lawmakers have spent $1.8 billion since the inception of the lottery on non-HOPE and non-pre-kindergarten, compared to $2.7 billion spent on the scholarship, itself.

During this same time span, a supposed funding crisis has caused the state legislators to cap the amount the scholarship pays for mandatory school fees, enforce a credit limit and instate an extra GPA checkpoint that has made it even more difficult for students to keep HOPE. Last year, lawmakers even threatened to cut the book stipend.

While it’s great that the $1.8 billion siphoned out of the lottery revenues went to pay for school technology programs, it seems illogical that such a large percentage of the overall money pool was pork-barreled away from HOPE when many of those same lawmakers were making noise about a looming funding crisis. Also, many of these so-called school technology programs could have found funding in local budgets.

But a bill to cut off funding isn’t necessary the answer to this problem. If an excess in funds exists from the lottery revenues, there is no reason why funds should not be allowed to go elsewhere to benefit educational programs. Lawmakers should work to ensure that HOPE and pre-kindergarten programs be given priority access to lottery funding—all available resources should be put into the program in order to avoid irksome caps and cuts to the scholarship.

Georgia’s HOPE scholarship is a model program for many states throughout the country. Our lawmakers have the responsibility to set a good example in how they choose to affect policy relating to the program, instead of using it as a political card when election year comes around.

The HOPE scholarship has done much for retention of well-qualified in-state students. It is crucial that the program be kept attractive for future classes of college students.

Consensus editorials reflect the majority opinion of the Editorial Board of the Technique, but not necessarily the opinions of individual editors.