Commentary: Course Registration

students are provided with the best possible learning environment,” the post read.

Kolberg said potential solutions for the student debt crisis besides canceling debt could be putting a cap on interest rates on student loans. Depending on what level of education, the U.S. Department of Education’s student loans have interest rates of 3.73–6.28% at a fxed rate. This means that the interest rate of the loan stays at the same rate for the duration of repayment.

However, some students like Hugonnet have to take out private student loans, which have variable rates. This means the interest rate of the loan can change throughout repayment. The average interest rate on private student loans can be anywhere from 0.94 – 11.98%. Loans with high risk of repayment failure are called subprime loans, which are commonly distributed by private lenders. This can put students with lower credit scores at risk of predatory lending, as subprime loans are harder to repay.

“You have to watch out for predatory businesses that are going to try to take advantage of this situation,” Kolberg said. “Some sort of cap on interest rates needs to be done to protect students in a pretty scary market.”

On the college’s Student Financial Services website, three private student loan companies are recommended for students — Citizens Bank, Discover and Sallie Mae. All three of these corporations have reached settlements with the U.S. government after using illegal banking practices like fraud and predatory lending. Sallie Mae’s loan servicing operation is carried out by Navient, one of the most proftable private student loan companies in America. In a January 2022 settlement, Navient canceled $1.9 billion in student loans after it was alleged that the corporation intentionally lent subprime loans it knew would fail to American college students.

Matthew Ford, the senior corporate communications specialist for Navient, said that the company denies criminal wrongdoing and that it has long advocated to change the student loan system.

“We have offered many options for student loan borrowers during the pandemic,” Ford said via email. “Navient recently announced an agreement with a number of state attorneys general to resolve legal matters. We expressly denied violating any law, including consumer-protection laws, or causing borrower harm.”

Despite being prey for private student loan companies, most of the college’s students who take out loans do so through the Department of Education’s loan department. While Biden has chipped away and canceled some outstanding student loans that are owed, students like Hugonnet will be buried in both public and private debt after graduation.

“It’s really stressful,” Hugonnet said. “I don’t like thinking about it. … I know you can defer them until you’re working, so I think I have one more year before I have to get started [paying]. But it’s daunting because you get out of school and you get a very basic, entry-level job, which doesn’t pay that much as is.”

I don’t know if anyone else feels this way, but registration for the last two semesters has felt a lot like entering the grounds for “The Hunger Games.” You wake up fve minutes before 7:30 a.m., prepare your laptop, you get your list of course registration numbers situated just next to Homer Connect and you wait. You wait for the race to start, one section, 15 seats or less and dozens of students gunning for it.

If you get into your classes and you win at registration every time, you deserve a medal — for the other kids not getting into the course they need to graduate is not your fault. It’s Ithaca College’s fault.

I have seen both sides of the spectrum and lived in an in-between. Some people come in with enough credits from high school to register a class ahead of everyone. Others are in the Honors Program and get to register with the very frst group.

People like me came in with just enough credits to stagger their registration so that they get to register a group ahead of every other semester. And then there are the students who have to go with everyone else.

If you are in the Roy H. Park School of Communications, you are working alongside over 300 other students, trying to get into the same classes. One section can have as few as 20 seats for students, and you pretty much have one chance to get it right.

If you don’t get into your classes, especially this early on as a sophomore, then your only option is to focus on your Integrative Core Curriculum and out-of-Park credits. Meaning that for an entire semester, you are doing nothing to hone your skills or prepare for your desired career. You will be a drone mindlessly learning things that genuinely don’t matter to you.

It isn’t the fault of the students who manage to get into the class or the professors who don’t have control over how many sections there are. The blame lies on the college’s administration and the decline in faculty.

I understand that the college is understaffed, underfunded and in a bit of a pinch right now. My major — writing for flm, television and emerging media — only had four f aculty members to begin with. Currently, we are work-

Commentary: Facing the nightmare before every course registration

BY MYA STENGEL

ing with three overworked professors teaching way more classes than they should be. The college made the choice to downsize the college’s faculty, but how are we supposed to graduate from the college if taking our required classes is no longer guaranteed?

I decided to graduate early because I managed to come into my freshman year with extra credits. The possibility was real as long as I stuck to my three-and-a-half-year plan.

However, I have begun to realize that no matter how hard I work, how well I do in my classes or how far ahead I plan, it seems that the college keeps working against me. The budget cuts, professor shortage and lack of care about education at this school will be my biggest pitfall here. If I can’t get into the classes I need, the money-hungry college that Ithaca College is will force me to pay nearly an additional $30,000.

I may not have to pay just to see if they will offer the classes they promised me. The college will increase our tuition and take our money, yet it denies us the classes we are supposedly paying for. It convinces us to stay, and we keep thinking it will be better next semester.

Since my freshman class has started here, the college has been going down a rabbit hole of trying to save itself from its fnancial crisis. I am sick of worrying if I will graduate on time at this school where the only thing standing in my way is the administration’s mismanagement. We need more professors, we need more sections. We need a better system.

Sophomore Mya Stengel pictured Nov. 17, 2021. Alyssa Beebe/The Ithacan.

THE ITHACAN DIVERSITY REPORT

BY ITHACAN STAFF

In late August, The Ithacan’s editorial board received a short survey designed by the community outreach manager that asked for demographic information with the intent to collect information for what would become the paper’s frst diversity report. A report of this kind is used to quantify the diverse makeup of an organization. It can also highlight a lack of diversity and inspire goals to address inclusion in the workplace. The survey consisted of seven questions. Some were answered by multiple choice and others were open-ended. While the responses remain anonymous, the fndings were charted and compared with available Ithaca College student population data. All 26 of the current editorial board members completed the survey.

Before publication, the results of this report were available internally and used for refection during The Ithacan’s diversity training workshop Oct. 8, led by the Center for Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Social Change (IDEAS) peer educators. The focus of the workshop was on implicit biases, which are unconscious stereotypes or attitudes that can manifest in our behavior and society. The fndings of this report were available as a tool to help to understand how implicit biases have an effect in a newsroom. While the workshop was available only to editorial board members, The Ithacan plans to implement future sessions open to all staff and mandate attendance at peer education workshops held by the Center for IDEAS in the future. While the paper has made conscious efforts to report inclusively and unbiasedly, there has never been a formal process in place to ensure the newsroom is actively working to do so.

This diversity report serves as a benchmark for future use as The Ithacan sets a standard of transparent reporting of the makeup of its newsroom. As a paper designed to represent student voices, it is important that there is a sustainable effort encouraging representation on the editorial board and equitable coverage of all student populations. The Ithacan recognizes that it has not completed a diversity report before and is actively working to remedy past indiscretions.

By preparing and publishing a diversity report for the end of the fall semester, the paper is working to hold itself accountable in its goal to create a more inclusive publication. Given that this survey is the frst of its kind, it may not be all-encompassing. A public forum in which members of the campus community were able to have an open conversation to discuss the fndings was held Jan. 31, 2022.

RACIAL AND ETHNIC BACKGROUND

FIRST-GENERATION

In accordance with the U.S. Census Bureau’s standard of collecting racial and ethnic background data, this survey question had six multiple choice options. The Ithacan editorial board is predominantly white. While there was no mixed-race option, this survey question allowed for multiple answers. The fndings show that no one on The Ithacan board is Alaskan Native or Pacifc Islander. The Black, Indigenous and people of color population on The Ithacan’s board represented 33.4% of the newsroom. This is 10.1% higher than the Black, Indigenous and people of color population at the college. Population data for the campus is located under the Offce of Analytics and Institutional Research on the college’s website. Its data classifcation is different, as the college includes international populations. While the survey did not have an international option, there are no international students on The Ithacan’s editorial board. For comparison, Ithaca College students are 72.4% white, 5.4% Black or African American, 10% Hispanic/Latino, 3.9% Asian, 0.1% Native American/Alaskan Native, 0.1% Native Hawaiian or Pacifc Islander, 3.8% two or more races, 1.8% unknown and 2.4% international.

According to the college’s website, 15% of the student body is frst-generation students. First-generation is defned as having parents who did not complete or begin a four-year degree in higher education. While the college’s data has not been updated for the 2021–22 academic year, it is clear the editorial board needs improvements in order to reach a higher level of frst-generation representation as it only had two board members who were frst-generation at the time of the survey.

FALL 2021

GRAPHS BY CASSANDRA LOGEDO

SEXUALITY GENDER MAJOR

This survey question was not multiple choice and

each board member wrote their answer in a text box.

This means the categories for sexuality data are spe-

cifc to how the board member completing the form identifes. The majority of the board identifed as heterosexual while 22.2% identifed as bisexual, 11.1% queer, 11.1% lesbian and one individual identifed as pansexual. For this and the following categories, there

is no readily available data to compare with the college’s

student body. The Ithacan board is predominantly com-

posed of cisgender women, with cisgender wom-

en making up 73.9%. The student body of the

college is reported as being 56.7% women and 43.3% men. Nonbinary representation on the editorial

board is low, at 4.3%, and transgender representation is nonexistent. The majority of board members have majors in the Roy H. Park School of Communications. Four

members, or 15.4% of the board, have a major in the School of Humanities and Sciences. The Ithacan is

currently looking for ways to recruit students from

other schools.

ABILITY CLASS YEAR

Like other categories, there is no publicly available data to compare the

larger student body with The Ithacan’s board. However, 95.7% of the edito-

rial board is able-bodied. The majority of the editorial board is upperclassmen with 46.2% being juniors, 38.5% seniors and 15.4% sophomores. The editorial board for the fall semester is hired during the previous spring semester, so there were no incoming freshmen on campus who were not

represented on the editorial board.