BLOG #3

How does the DREAM Act relate to privatization?

While researching the DREAM Act, I came to a huge realization. Though privatization is making higher education more accessible for some, it is making it completely unobtainable financially for others. With rising tuition costs and a large sum of loan debt as a possibility, a college education is just not financially possible for some students who do not qualify for Federal, State or school financial aid. Students who desire to further their knowledge after high school might just not be able to take advantage of the many educational opportunities present in our country. This feeling must be a frustrating one, and I can directly relate it to the feeling that many alien minors have after they graduate high school. Though they are fully capable to attend college, they simply cannot afford it because they are not eligible for Federal financial aid. Due to privatization, and college essentially becoming more of a business endeavor with the increase of for-profit universities, many American high-school graduates are feeling helpless toward their futures, just like alien minors feel without the passage of the DREAM Act.

Blog #2 REVISED

My topic is still the DREAM Act, however I have developed in into two sides of it: the moral argument and the economic argument. Both of those sub-topics have the ability to be argued both for and against the DREAM Act. After doing further research, I see the two opposing viewpoints and understand why it is still a prominent point of discussion for politicians and has not been passed although it was introduced in 2001. My research also provided me with a lot more information on how the DREAM Act is economically beneficial to our country and how it can improve not just the economic standing of alien minors but also of American citizens. The following link gave me a lot of information on that: http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/immigration/news/2012/10/01/39746/passing-the-dream-act-for-our-economy/.  I also discovered that this argument can be countered by the fact that allowing alien students accessed to Federal Financial Aid does cost the American taxpayer money, which is a core reason why many oppose this law. This biggest controversy over this bill is that it is morally unsound, which I did not quite understand. After further searching I found four main arguments against the DREAM Act, here: http://www.utsa.edu/twp/spring12/0103spring2012.pdf, and understood why certain Americans oppose the legislation. All and all, while researching for the DREAM Act I have found a plethora of information, both scholarly articles and news articles that give a lot of factual and statistical information about alien minors and the economic impact of the law. I found it most interesting that I can easily demonstrate two completely different opinions on one topic and I would be interested to find out how other college students feel about this piece of legislation.

Blog #1 REVISED

The topic I am mainly considering for my research project is on the topic of the DREAM Act. The DREAM Act, or the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors aims to provide higher education for those students are undocumented residents of the United States. I find this topic especially interesting because it is not something that many college students think about often. We may not think about how there are students who are striving to better their education and job potential however they hit a road block after high school. Many of these students have lived their entire lives in the United States, however because their parents brought them here when they were children and were unable to obtain citizenship for them, become stuck in economic hardship. The DREAM Act serves to allow these students the opportunity to participate in higher education and gives them a path to lawful American Citizenship. I believe the DREAM Act serves as a reminder to college students to appreciate the education easily available to us while alien minors struggle for the ability to attend college.

Blog #1

For the analytical essay, the topics I am considering are:

- how privatization affects the middle class specifically. I found this especially interesting in the "Paying for the Party" article and would like to develop this further. I was especially intrigued by the stories of the "wannabes"

-how privatization has affected women in society ,including undergraduate and post-graduate life choices. Being a college woman, I feel I relate to this topic the most and find it the most interesting.

- how privatization affects the upper class less than the middle/lower classes and why. It is clear that the upper class is less affected by the privatization of education and end up to be successful either way. I think it would be interesting to compare and contrast the undergraduate/postgraduate differences between middle and upper class students. It appears that family stature is a more impactful determinant of a student's future success than educational ambition is.