University of Puerto Rico students strike...again.

Let me give some background to this absurd and fucking pathetic display.

UPR students are protesting a raise in tuition, the first in fourteen years. In contrast, Pell Grants have gone up 69% since 1991. Undergraduate credits will be raised $10 and graduate $25 (from $75 to $100), a tech. quota of $25 will be implemented, and the maintenence quota will be raised $10 a semester to $45.60.

This means that undetgraduate credits at UPR will be $40 each, with the increase. They currently cost $30. Pell grants, which 61% of their students receive, cover everything. In fact, only 30% of the grant money is needed to pay for tution AND books! They keep the rest. Moreover, if you are the child of a UPR employee, an honor student, or enter in band, chorus, or sports; you are exempt from paying, and not only study for free, but get all the grant money for yourself! In total, only 29% of the entire university's student body pays anything for their education at all.

Source

Even worse, you need a 3.25 average to get in, and it's the state university! Private university students pay an average of $145 a credit, and have to take loans to complete tuition.

These people are insane, spoiled, and arrogant. One of them was carrying a sign the other day which read "education is a right, not a privilege." Talk about misinformed. :rolleyes:

That's ridiculous. It's about 1650 or so for 10-18 credits here.

18 credits at UPR = about $600, with all quotas.

i pay around $350 a credit. Hooray for private school! Those kids are idiots, that's the cheapest college i've ever heard of.

I'm jealous.

Mine was about $5k a semester (living on campus, full time. And that's for living in the same state of the school). I think it's pushing 6k now.

A lot of Puerto Ricans dont know how easy they have it some times.

One of my Puerto Rican friends bitched so much when he found out he was going to have to pay taxes after moving over here.I had no idea Puerto Ricans got away without having to pay Federal,and I'm pretty damn sure they dont have to pay anything resembling a state tax.

I'm paying $22,000 a year. What the fuck they complaining about?

37,000 for 2 years of a degree, it's like 350 a credit hour, fuck puerto Rico they deserve the punishment of becoming an official state.

Everyone's public tuition should be so low. Maybe the reason why its so fucking low is that these people will actually get up and protest instead of just cutting a bigger fucking check that inevitably gets lost in bureacracy. A person who entered the Univ. of California system in 2002 is now paying nearly twice what they did when they started. The UC is all I am familiar with but I know this is happening across the country. It is inexcusable.

One thing that should be done is that a person's tuition should be the same all four years. Whatever you pay as a frosh is what you pay the entire time. Thats the law in Illinois and it should become the standard. Itd give people an incentive to leave after four years instead of waddling around for five or six, and itd give universities a reason not to jack up tuition just because they have their students captive (transferring is a bitch).

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Originally Posted by Jetman

A lot of Puerto Ricans dont know how easy they have it some times.

One of my Puerto Rican friends bitched so much when he found out he was going to have to pay taxes after moving over here.I had no idea Puerto Ricans got away without having to pay Federal,

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Maybe it has something to do with the fact that we can't vote for the president nor do we have a voting representative in Congress. No taxation without representation, remember?

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I'm pretty damn sure they dont have to pay anything resembling a state tax.

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FICA does apply here though. We also pay a state tax, and through the nose as it is.

The community college that I'm attending for the moment rose tuition a little bit and the school's chapter of NYPIRG, which specializes in leading college kids like lemmings, had all of the flags in the school lowered half-mast because of the "death of education." They also held candle-light vigils on the subject. They kept coming into the rest of the clubs in the school trying to rally us up for their cause. I just laugh at them. Every time.
Seriously, it was maybe $200. If they want to protest something, it should be how much those fucking teachers make. Criminy.
Stuff costs money, though kids want everything to be free,

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Originally Posted by Melf

Maybe it has something to do with the fact that we can't vote for the president nor do we have a voting representative in Congress. No taxation without representation, remember?

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Heh, good point.

But I'm sure my Puerto Rican friend voted in the last election and the one prior. Is it just if you currently reside in PR that you cant vote or what? then again...He might have just changed his residency status come to think of it....

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Originally Posted by Melf

FICA does apply here though. We also pay a state tax, and through the nose as it is.

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okay, didnt know that.

Yeah, it all has to do with residency. If you were to move to PR, you couldn't vote either. Someone born and raised here moves stateside and they get all the voting privileages. It's a status issue.

I'm Puerto Rican and I already graduated years ago, but believe me when I tell you, that college, the UPR is filled with freeloading parasites. And it's not just the students, but teachers as well. They have this twisted mindset that Americans are oppressing and abusing them and that they are "fighting for freedom" and independence from the U.S. It's disgusting and retarded.

They bitch, whine and protest about how they recieve an unfair treatment by americans and how they want U.S. to leave the island but the first thing they do on their free time is go to the mall, Burger King, or McDonalds's and when they put their hand inside their pockets they pull out the U.S. currency. And don't even get me started on the scholarships, it's like payday for them. In fact, I think this is what I believe the whole mess is about, the fact that now after fully covering the credits, and the books, they're not gonna have all that extra cash to spend from the residual scholarship checks.

Melf: Is Puerto Rico still recieving all kinds of money from the U.S.? I remember hearing that it was pratically a welfare state a few years back. Also, hoe often do they vote on whether or not to become a state?

My dad was right, I should've gone to study in Puerto Rico.

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Originally Posted by ShineAqua

Melf: Is Puerto Rico still recieving all kinds of money from the U.S.? I remember hearing that it was pratically a welfare state a few years back.

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PR gets the rap for being a welfare state because the U.S. uses the same bar for measuring income as they do in the states. The average income per capita in PR is just above 11k, and anyone who makes below 16k is considered "poor" by the U.S. government, hence all the aid and such.

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Also, how often do they vote on whether or not to become a state?

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We've had three plebicites in 30 years, as well as numerous conferences and projects taken before Congress and the UN, all ignored by the U.S. government.

Wait, does PR want to become a state? I remember hearing that PR wants nothing to do with the U.S. in order to retain their cultural identity. Or are you saying that they're trying to oust the american from their politics?

95% of the population wants some type of permanent relation with the U.S., be it though statehood or some type of associated free state. We've been trying forever to get some type of answer from Congress, but they always give us the "whatever you decide is fine by us" answer, which is akin to you going into a restaurant and being told you'll get whatever you decide to order...only they never show you a menu. :p