THE SOUTHERN MAINE COMMUNITY COLLEGE STUDENT NEWSPAPER | Volume 8 • No. 1 • SEPTEMBER 12, 2012
Sustaining Higher Education: A Conversation With Angus King Senatorial Candidate Angus King Discusses Higher Education
PHOTO BY DENISE MICHAUD
By Daniel E. Gagne tudents today face the continual increasing burden of debt in order to obtain a degree. As technology has evolved we are no longer the farmers of yesteryear. We are a race of technologically savvy capitalists. Thriving in society today requires us to get training beyond primary and secondary schools, although not always a four year degree or better. Of course a bachelor’s, master’s degree, or a doctorate is not necessary in many fields, but the largest growing sector is in training short of these. It seems however, that most of us today are bombarded with advertisements of many forms that lead us to believe that attending a university is an absolute must in order to succeed. The average cost of that college education has been out of control for decades at a rate triple that of inflation. Here at SMCC we have been lucky to have those rates at just over 2% annually since 2001, only one third of most other institutions matching very close to the rate of inflation, while simultaneously grow at around 15%.
Send Them to the Streets SMCC Photo Students Exhibit Work By Sarah Dutil of street photography is to capture that pivhe Art House, a cozy gallery located at 61 Pleasant Street, located just outside Portland’s Old Port district, ended their summer season of exhibitions with the display “Street Photography.” Students from Liz Bieber’s summer Photo 1 classes had the wonderful opportunity to exhibit their photographic responses to a “Street Photography” assignment given them earlier in the summer semester. The gist of the assignment is to explore, and document a sense of Portland, or any city streets, by using the subject matter found in and around these streets. When asked to expand on the parameters of the assignment Ms Bieber explained, “One idea 2 Welcome Back! Career & Transfer Connections 3 Free Money Medical Supplies 4 PSTD On Top of the World 5 Soul-Making True Love? 6 Networking Identity 7 Op-Editorials 9 Gluten-Free The Candidate 10 Off Beat Music Events 11 Sports
otal moment when light, composition, and moment converge. Initially many students can have trepidations about shooting strangers. The thing about shooting strangers is, it is, a little nerve racking. It’s controversial. Shooting in a public space is a right, but it doesn’t always feel like it is. In the end, the very same students presented the most captivating images.” Hosted by Liz and a handful of students from the class, one could easily tell that each photographer’s take on the assignment was coming from a different perspective. Faculty, fellow SMCC students and the curious trickled into view the work, entering and leaving the space with a warm and cheerful energy. Students spoke about their learning process throughout this project, saying they found that strangers were more likely to take a real photo when they were unaware they were being photographed. Over all, the event had a very pleasing turn out.
PHOTOS BY SARA DUTIL
Angus King, now running for the U.S. Senate, agreed to be interviewed by The Beacon to discuss this very problem. He grew up in Alexandria, Va. to a family whose parents were the first to go to college. His mother, in order to attend college in the 20’s and 30’s, had a scholarship which stipulated that she become a teacher for every year she had a scholarship after graduation in order to repay the foundation. Before becoming Governor, or running for Senate, he taught at both Bowdoin and Bates colleges, and continued to be an educator as recent as last spring. Having such a history in post-secondary education, as well as being governor for two consecutive terms, he has quite a unique view on how the system works. That being said, he also has a lot to say on why college cost is such a huge problem for students and families struggling with how to finance an education without creating unsustainable debt. In response to whether or not colleges and universities should be penalized for higher than average default rates, King exclaimed, “Boy, I’ve never heard that! That’s a really interesting idea… That implies their really not taking care of their students. That’s an idea that deserves some real consideration. That’s a way of indirectly policing what we talked about, which is giving them more help when they come in.” When asked if allowing students to utilize bankruptcy protection to wipe out overburdened student debt would act to help stimulate the economy, King replied, “I don’t know. (Continued on page 10)