Starting last January the Washington State Legislature met for 60 days to discuss changes for students in higher education. Justus Phelps, a senior and Director of Legislative Affairs for the Associated Students of Washington State University, Vancouver, was there lobbying for bills to improve higher education. He considers it a success and points to nine bills the Legislature passed.
Phelps said one bill stands out as one of the most import. The open educational resource bill provides a grant of $137,000 to all professors for free online textbooks.
Another major project was fully funding the State Need Grant which will be implemented in 2020-21. During the recession, Washington state government put 20,000 students on a waitlist to receive necessary grants for tuition. Each year, for the next four years, $18 million will be put into a final supplemental budget for a total of $72 million in grants for students on waitlists since 2008.
Many successful bills were pushed by students in other public four-year universities and are expected to be implemented by this summer. However, Phelps said, “most people will be feeling this next fall.” Some of the other ‘wins’, as the Washington Student Association puts it, is having expanded and protected financial aid for undocumented students. Other successes include consumer protections for students with loans they cannot pay back, decoupling service and activity fees from tuition, increased mental health services and more availability for child care on campus. These were all bills that WSU Vancouver student Justice Phelps said he pushed for the most.
Other bills passed included voter registration expansion for youth to vote in local, state and national elections. Another bill called the Washington Voting Rights Act now protects both voters and local governments by creating a clear and collaborative process for addressing the problem of disagreeing over voting without involving the federal courts. Phelps said, “this is a year we could get a bunch of little asks out of the way because this was a non-budget year. Next year is a budget year which means new money, bigger asks.” “Little asks” as explained by Phelps, only cost the state a few hundred thousand dollars this year, but “bigger asks” look more like funding a life science building or the $72 million going towards the state need grant.
More information about the recent legislative activity are available on the Washington Student Association website or you can contact ASWSUV Director of Legislative Affairs, Justus Phelps at aswsuv.dla@wsu.edu.
In related legislative news, on March 24 Senator Lynda Wilson, and Representatives Paul Harris and Vicki Kraft spoke at the town hall at WSU Vancouver. Many community members in attendance were concerned with gun safety in schools as well as possible income tax increases. While this does not directly affect WSU Vancouver students specifically, it will affect students outside of school. The legislators encouraged members to contact through through phone or email with additional questions or concerns.
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