Column: UNC students deserve Board of Governors voice

Affordability, fair representation and a multitude of well-heeded voices are what distinguish UNC as a public university.

This was not the case when the Board of Governors decided to freeze and cap the percent of tuition that could go toward need-based aid.

I set out to figure out why this was. 

Roger Aiken, secretary of the Board’s Budget and Finance Committee, stressed that the decision was made to prevent future tuition hikes and protect working and middle-class families.  Some UNC officials worry the “freeze and cap” will intensify problems of access and affordability, as non-tuition costs, such as housing and healthcare, are projected to rise.

UNC’s former chancellor, James Moeser, told me that education should not be considered a private good, but rather a public one that serves more than the individual — it serves society.

“There are a lot of people who think we are the last really public university,” he said. “That’s a noble place, but it’s a sad statement.”

We must wake up to the urgency of rising costs and debt, but dig deeper. The “freeze and cap” was passed with little to no solicitation of student opinion.

The Board values the authority and ideologies of 32 state-appointed administrators, but it is unreflective of the diverse perspectives of the UNC system’s population.

 Historically, efforts to democratize the Board have called for public comment sections at meetings, for board members to conduct university-related business on public email accounts and for voting power for student, staff and faculty.

The UNC system needs a legitimized student voice on the Board, not another toothless tiger: UNC Association of Student Governments President Alex Parker serves as the board’s student representative but lacks voting power. Consequently, we need our student government to speak up, and we need to have a coalition of students behind them who see that student concerns are addressed.

UNC Student Body President Andrew Powell said the student community must be proactive about engaging with tuition and financial aid.

“Ideally there would be enough institutional memory and enough structure in place on our campus and system-wide so that when something needs to happen in a week’s turnaround, we already have those relationships we’ve been building,” he said.

The people who work and study at this University must help drive decision-making and not leave it to a top-down,  mostly white, mostly male group of administrators.

Our energy and attention cannot be temporary or fleeting. We, the students, must exercise constant pressure and vigilance. Decisions like these can and will repeat themselves, and reactionary responses stand to set us back further.

The urgency of student indebtedness is an opportunity for students to form a more constructive relationship with the Board of Governors and push for lasting democratization of the body.