Ever wonder why your tuition is so high at Castleton compared to other schools? In part, it’s because Vermont higher education funding ranks 50th out of fifty, meaning Vermont gives the least amount of higher education funding of any state.

According to John Howard and Ben Johnson, two officials from United Professionals of Vermont and the American Federation of Teachers, higher education funding in Vermont has dropped by more than 50 percent over the last 30 years. The only way that Vermont schools have been able to stay alive without barely any state funding is through tuition increases. Even if more people attend college in Vermont the cost of tuition still has to rise to cover all cost.

“I know Vermont has a low population, but I’m pretty sure it’s not the smallest population so funding should go by population size, and we shouldn’t get the least amount of funding,” said student Kailie Courtney.

A pamphlet being handed out on campus about the issue said, “because of the high tuition cost and low state funding, more students have to rely on education loans to pay for college.”

“If more money is not made available to help with the rising cost, there will come to a point that students and their parents will not be able to pay for the cost of college which is rising faster than Vermonters wages and the rate of infiltration,” said student Brittany Baranowski says. “It’s just not fair that we get such little funding.”

A booth was set up two weeks ago in the Campus Center with students discussing these statistics and bringing awareness of Vermont’s dismal funding performance.

The main goal of the table was to educate people about this issue so while they were at the voting booths they would hopefully vote for candidates in support of higher education

Sociology professor Linda Olsen said, these are the reasons tuition is so high and salaries are so low.

“Clearly Vermont state colleges are not supported by our state,” she said.