Education Is a Right — Not a Reward
States are giving away a handful of college scholarships in a lottery for students who get vaccinated. It’s like something out of dystopian sci-fi: only a lucky few get to avoid crushing student debt, the rest suffer. It doesn’t have to be this way.
Officials in select states are holding out the grand prize of affordable public education to a handful of lucky kids who are entered into a lottery when they get their COVID-19 vaccine. (Kelly Sikkema / Unsplash)
Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, and Chuck Schumer have spent months asking President Biden to use his authority to eliminate or reduce crushing student debt. Biden promised to do so, and all he has to do is sign this piece of paper. But he has refused, despite new Roosevelt Institute research showing that educational debt relief “would provide more benefits to those with fewer economic resources and could play a critical role in addressing the racial wealth gap and building the Black middle class.”
As student debt crushes the elderly and people of color, into this vacuum comes a rescue . . . for a lucky few. Public officials have taken the idea of affordable college from something the world’s wealthiest nation should be able to provide to everyone, and converted it into an expensive luxury item only for the superrich, those unfortunate enough to be the victim of a terrorist attack, or those lucky enough to win the lottery.
Literally.
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