It’s 7:20 a.m., and a Wertz
bus is idling outside the library
by the student lot. A professor
with a ponytail is standing
alone by the bus door looking
nervous. At this early hour the
lot is rather empty. Departure
time is approaching and music
professor John Sheridan does
not want to head to Harrisburg
to lobby for better funding
alone.
Three music majors make
their way across the campus
grass. One is clutching a disposable
coffee cup and a cigarette.
The students talk about
the smoking ban. Which they
don’t care for. They also don’t
care for the 7 percent tuition
hike.
The group piles on the bus.A
young woman gives out mini
Gatorades that she has brought
along. The students talk about
piercings and jamming earrings
through when your ear
closes up.
Another professor pokes his
head up by the front of the bus.
This is it. He climbs in.
“We’re the only three people
who can b**ch about tuition
going up,” says one student
participant to the others.
An empty box hangs where a
television once was. The seats
are a colorful mixture of grey
blue splashed with hot pink
and aqua.
Everyone is sprawled out on
his or her own double seat, taking
up a clump in the middle of
the bus, leaving about three
quarters of it empty.
Taylor Ejdys plans to double
major in business and music.
This is her first year at Bucks.
She plays the piano and works
as a server at Garden of Eaten
for money. She makes about
$300 a week.
Oliver Breen is looking for
work and paying for his tuition
with loans. He’s a talented
singer who wants to become a
teacher to see “that light bulb
go off.” He has a deep emotional
connection to music that
he wants to share. He wants to
do that without accumulating a
mountain of debt.
Sara Whitmore is trying to
make it through her whole
music theory book on the bus.
Sheridan is hanging out with
three members of his music
theory class. He’s leaning over
the seat to talk to Whitmore
about classes for next semester.
They all call Sheridan
“John,” or sometimes “dude.”
“You have a different emotional
connection with an arts
professor,” explains Oliver.
John Strauss, a language and
literature professor, is shuffling
papers in and out of an orange
envelope.
In his hands are postcards for
each representative signed by
their student constituents. The
cards demand better funding
for higher education. Each representative
will receive
between 60 and 90 of these
gifts today.
Strauss and Sheridan are
accompanying the students on
Community College Lobbying
Day, a day where representatives
from Pennsylvania’s
community colleges head to
Harrisburg to have a voice.
Oliver turned 21 at midnight
last night. He walked in at a
quarter to 1 a.m. “My dad said
‘you’re never going to get up,”
said Oliver. “I said ‘yea, dad
it’s important.”
“We’re a state- and countyfunded
institution,” Strauss
says to the students. “If you’re
not on top of that you lose.”
Money. Money. Money. It
doesn’t work without money.
The roughly 7 percent tuition
hike recently announced for
Bucks will pull a few extra
hundred dollars a year out of
students’ pockets. Students
once footed 33 percent of the
bill for community college.
Now, when the state, the county
and the student get together,
the student is left holding half
the check, with tuition covering
50 percent of costs.
The people in this bus think
that sucks.
Conversation on the bus
ping-pongs between piercings,
the evolution of computers and
cars. Every few minutes the
tuition issue comes up again.
The professors reminisce
about old cars. “You could
hang your nails out the window
and file your nails on the
road in that car,” Strauss wistfully
recalls of one particular
model.
Oliver not so fondly remembers
three bad water pumps in
a Ford Probe.
The bus was paid for ahead
of time. It is a rather expensive
ride for a handful of students.
On the right, out the window,
is a shopping center sign that
reads, “Walmart, Lowes,
Strayer University.”
Strauss collected the cards at
an information table he set up
by the cafeteria. He says he
sent a letter out to the staff,
asking people to announce the
event in their classes. He is
bummed about the apathy.
Strauss doesn’t blame students.
At this point in the
semester, many cannot afford
to miss another class. A lot
work. A whole day is a big
commitment.
Strauss wants to see county
lobbying as the next step.
More students might be able to
participate on a local level
because there would be less
travel time involved.
The county currently funds
14 percent of the cost of community
college, according to
Strauss. A far cry from its third
of the bill. Actually, less than
half.
He isn’t saying quality is
going down dramatically at
Bucks, but he is seeing some
change.
Strauss says the college
employs a lot of part-time staff
instead of full timers to save
money.
Part-time staff, in his opinion,
cannot afford to devote as
much time to students if they
have to work other jobs.
Teaching takes a chunk of
time to do well, he says.
“I spend half an hour per
paper I grade,” says Strauss.
“If I have 21 students in each
section and three sections, it
adds up.”
For students, transferring
two years at Bucks to a fouryear
college is still a bargain.
Some are wondering if they
will have transferable credits
as funding decreases. Classes
have to meet standards.
Four- year college students
have it worse this year.
Villanova raised tuition by the
amount of the total cost of
tuition at Bucks.
Bucks is receiving the same
amount of funding from the
state as it did three years ago.
The problem is more students
are attending. The college has
lost money in relationship to
the number of students.
This is Strauss’ first year
doing the event. The college
and the teacher’s union are
cosponsoring the trip.
Last year, Bucks President
James Linksz took a few students
to the capital. The
Community College of
Philadelphia takes a few bus
loads. Philadelphia inspired
Strauss to try for a bigger event
at Bucks.
The bus stops in front of the
capital stairs behind two yellow
school buses that are
swarming with elementary
school kids. Chaperones carry
their lunch boxes in cardboard
boxes.
The college students leave
their “excessive junk” on the
bus since they will be going
through metal detectors. A student
takes a breath from her
inhaler and the group piles off.
Sheridan gives out his cell
phone number in case someone
needs it, talking loudly over
the crowd.
The group heads up the stairs
through the metal detectors in
to the $13 million building.
Sheridan takes Sara and
Taylor to meet with some reps.
Strauss takes Oliver.
Strauss is running late and
the building is a maze.
Regular-looking doors open to
include more doors. The large
numbers on the plaques have
smaller numbers under them
that don’t correspond at all.
Room 120 has a yellow
post-it note reading “and
room 121.” Where is
platform nine and three
quarters (room 216)?
Strauss passes through a hallway
of white metal swirls that
looks oddly like Cinderella’s
carriage. Two gold and crystal
chandeliers float in the fairy
tale room.
Heels click along the white
marble. Through a peach room
highlighted with dark wood,
through a library, detailed
carved archways, up some
stairs. Around in a circle.
Finally, a gold plaque reads
“Bucks County.”
An assistant meets the pair
and ushers them into a dark,
masculine office and seats
them at a round dark wooden
table stacked high with letters.
The assistant apologizes and
picks up the letters. A lot of
people have come today.
Everyone wants something.
A man with striking blue
eyes that match his pale blue
dress shirt shakes hands with
Strauss and Oliver. He is
Representative Paul Clymer’s
education staffer. Clymer represents
the 145th district of
Bucks County.
He listens carefully, making
eye contact as Strauss and
Oliver tell him what has been
going on. Strauss suggests
closing corporate tax loopholes
to find more funding. Oliver
puts a human face on the issue,
explaining why an affordable
education is important. When
Oliver came to Bucks his
G.P.A. shot up. Bucks challenged
him. He wants other
kids to have the same chance.
Clymer’s staffer agrees to do
what he can, to pass the message
along. He thanks the pair
for coming and they’re off to
the next representative.
Strauss seems relieved and
surprised at how well the student
made the case. He didn’t
have to say much.
Marguerite Quinn represents
the 143rd district of Bucks
County. This includes
Doylestown and Buckingham.
She’s up next.
Her assistant meets up with
Oliver and Strauss in the
Cinderella swirls hallway. She
explains that this will have to
be a “walk and talk.” Quinn is
due on the floor soon.
The friendly woman hurries
the group around the building,
up an escalator, through some
glass doors, on to a white
couch.
Quinn sits at a dark desk with
bookshelves behind it.
The assistant introduces the
pair and everyone shakes
hands. Quinn is in a blue suit.
She has dark cropped hair, fair
skin and berry-stained lips.
The group begins making its
case. Quinn listens. She wants
to know exactly how much
tuition has gone up per year for
a student. She asks Oliver
questions about his experience.
Strauss tells her he’s
brought gifts and hands her
the stack of postcards. Quinn
flips through them. She
knows one of the student
names already. She is sorting
through looking for more
names she knows.
Quinn says she understands.
She appears frustrated, gesturing
to books thicker than the
average Bible behind her.
These two books are the last
two budgets. She explains that
she gets one vote on a list of
items. She’ll try, but she is not
making promises she can’t
keep.
The assistant pokes her head
in and says she needs to “tick
Quinn’s tock.” It is time for her
to be on the floor.
Quinn seems struck by the
postcards and brings them
with her, agreeing to read
them on the floor.
The day is full of visits to
offices to drop off post cards.
Strauss and Sheridan meet
up. College President James
Linksz meets the group at the
capital building. He is wearing
a bow tie and shakes each student’s
hand.
Representative Frank Farry
gets the group to meet
Representative Melio.
Everyone meets up with
Bucks County State
Representative Anthony
Melio. He is an older gentleman
who asks if the group
would like to see the representatives
in action.
The group enters a loud,
bustling room. Each representative
has a laptop displaying a
proposition. The seating is
similar to pews with long
tables in front. One representative
is munching on a salad
while working on a laptop. A
man at the podium is talking
about clean drinking water.
The representatives designate a
time to devote to drinking
water. Loyalty day is declared
in May.
Large security guards with
badges quickly usher the group
off the floor. Melio protests,
but the group has more reps to
talk to so they go quietly.
Bernie O’Neill talks to the
group informally. He is a
trustee of the college and there
is no need to preach to the
choir.
The rest of the day is like
trick-or-treating. The group
stops by the offices of Watson,
DiGirolamo, Santarsiero, and
Galloway delivering presents.
Hopefully they will be read.
In Watson’s office a man
with a red, yellow, and green
bracelet and a lot of piercings
sits strumming a guitar in slippers.
He seems strangely out of
place, and it is as though the
group has entered a tent at a
music festival.
The man gets a ride to a nearby
art college with his mother,
who works in the building.
Outside winds a line of
ational Rifle Association
members. They are here for
guns and their right to keep
them. A little girl in a blue
Tea Party baseball cap holds
the hand of a man in a suit.
Elementary children bustle
about. Copies of alcohol
awareness posters drawn by
student winners are free for the
taking on a table. A man at a
podium is getting ready to
demand smokeless tobacco be
highly taxed.
The group gathers on the
stairs and snaps a picture
together. Then it is out of the
strange mix of just about
everyone who wants something
and in to the fresh air.
Outside a woman with gray
hair in a straw hat smokes a
cigarette.
A boy in a hand drawn tshirt
walks by; the shirt
reads “Christian educated,
pro-life, pro-gun.”
The group of music majors
may not have t-shirts or baseball
caps, but today they had a
voice.
Strauss says he didn’t have to
say much, “the students knew
what they were talking about
and how to say it.”
Strauss and Sheridan are
pleased with the day. Every
representative in Bucks
County either got a stack of
postcards or a visit. “I was
amazed,” said Strauss. “For a
few people we really got a lot
done.”
Sheridan is thrilled that the
students got to be on the floor,
that they met the representatives,
met the president of the
college.
“On the days when there’s
money it’s more fun to be a
politician,” says Linksz.
He understands that everyone
wants their piece of the
pie. Basic education, senior
care, all of it has to be covered.
Linksz is happy with the day
and the postcards especially.
Oliver will encourage more
people to come next year.
“You should definitely
consider doing something
about funding,”
says Oliver. “ot only
for yourself, but for
those who desperately
need a higher education.”
Oliver was a little anxious in
the morning before meeting
the reps, but by the end of the
day it was “just a person talking
to a person.”
As for the less-than-full bus,
Sheridan is not taking it to
heart.
“We learned a lot about what
we need to do to mobilize more
students,” said Sheridan.