Thanks so much.
Good afternoon. I'm Dr. Mark Thomas,
Executive Vice President, Chief
Strategy Officer here at Madison
College.
I want to welcome you all and thank
you for joining us today at our
Goodman South Campus here in
Madison. Joining me this afternoon
are the leaders of Wisconsin's three
major higher education systems, Jay
Rothen, President of the
Universities of Wisconsin, Dr.
Eric Folkner, President of the
Wisconsin Association of Independent
Colleges and Universities, and of
course President Mary Field of
Wisconsin Technical College System
of which Madison College is
affiliated. That you will also hear
from.
Colleges students Jose Villarreal.
We're here to express our concerns
about the legislation passed earlier
this morning by the US House of
Representatives which has
significant impacts on our student
populations.
Others will speak to several
significant barriers to students
that would result from this
legislation if it were passed into
law as written but I'd be remiss
if I didn't mention that many mass
many community college students
including the ones here at Madison
College are already working one or
two low wage jobs that's why they're
trying to increase their educational
attainment so that they can serve in
the workforce with the skills our
local businesses need, earning
family supporting wages.
And that's why financial aid has a
clear return on investment for our
students. So thank you for joining
us here at Madison College.
And now I'd like to hand it off to
President Maryfield.
Thanks for being here today.
The Student Success and Taxpayer
Savings Plan, the legislation that
was incorporated into the
US House's reconciliation bill
earlier this morning, would
have a significant impact on
Wisconsin's technical college
students.
We serve over 287,000 students
each year.
Significant portions of those
students are very low income.
They are economically disadvantaged.
And as you heard from
Mark, they are working
To get into higher wage jobs,
family sustaining careers.
That's why they come to Wisconsin's
technical colleges.
We have serious concerns
about the numbers of students who
would lose Pell grants eligibility
entirely. We think, according
to our preliminary analysis,
at least 6,000 students would
lose eligibility entirely,
many thousands more would lose
portions of their grants as they
would be prorated based
on the number of credits that these
students are able to take.
And when they're working part-time
and often raising families on their
own, it's very difficult for them
to increase those credit loads and
stay successful, both in college,
career, and in their family
responsibilities.
So we would urge reconsideration
of this legislation and
allow our students to continue
to work towards the
careers that Wisconsin's
employers are crying out for them
join. In terms of the
skilled workforce shortages that
we see all across Wisconsin.
We think we're addressing that
really directly and we want to get
those students into those jobs as
quickly as possible.
I'd like to introduce Jose
Villarreal,
sorry Jose,
a Madison College student who's here
to speak to his experience.
My name is Jose Villarreal.
I am a student at Madison College,
president of our Student Senate and
Wisconsin Technical College System
student ambassador.
I also rely on the Pell Grant to
afford college.
Without that support, I might not be
standing here today.
I'd be working more hours, taking
fewer classes, or maybe not college
at all.
We talk a lot about barriers to
education. For many of us, the
biggest one is cost.
Pell grant helps remove that
barrier. They make college possible.
That's why I'm here, to share what
it would mean if credit requirements
for appellate grants were increased.
For students like me, that change
would make a hard situation even
harder.
It's not as simple as signing up for
one more class.
I'm already taking as many credits
as I can while working, being
present, father
to my young daughter, and managing
responsibilities outside of the
classroom.
I'm doing everything I can to stay
on track and earn my degree.
Adding another class isn't just
about effort, it's not about wanting
success.
Badly enough, my days are full,
my early mornings, late nights, a
lot of hard work.
Raising the credit requirements
wouldn't speed up my education.
It would slow it down.
It would force me to choose between
work and school.
It would make the path harder.
It would push students out.
And I'm not alone, thousands of
students at Madison College and
across Wisconsin are doing their
best to stay on track.
Raising the requirements would
punish the very students these grads
are meant to support.
If we want a stronger workforce
and a stronger economy, we need to
support the students already giving
it everything they got.
Don't move the goalpost, please.
Don't make it harder for us.
Please, and thank you.
Good afternoon, I'm Jay Rothman,
President of the Universities of
Wisconsin.
I want to underscore, in essence
what Jose just said, underscore the
critical reason that the
three of us, the three presidents
of the higher education institutions
in Wisconsin, are here together
today.
Federal financial aid has played a
critical role in helping improve
the lives of hundreds of thousands
of students over the past several
decades.
And it is shocking to see that
programs, that those programs are
currently under threat.
So I want to thank my colleagues for
joining me in seeking to bring
attention to these potentially
devastating changes and to
the students who are with us today.
Let me be blunt.
It simply makes no sense,
no sense for the United States right
now to narrow educational
opportunities if our country
is going to have an opportunity
to win the global war for
talent.
I am dumbfounded that cutting
educational opportunities would
even be considered when
our economic vibrancy as a nation
is at stake.
Yet the House of Representatives
this morning approved a budget
package that will roll back
educational opportunities for
students like those who are with us
today.
It is not too late for Congress to
reverse course and do the right
thing for Wisconsin's students and
families and preserve opportunities
for future generations.
Wisconsin's 13 public
universities that I have the
privilege of serving help
students across our state.
Our mission is simple.
It is to make Wisconsin better,
to make Wisconsin stronger.
Together, our universities educate
nearly 31,600
Pell Grant recipients who
are depending on financial aid to
get the educational opportunities
that will be life-changing.
We know these experiences change
the trajectory of people's lives.
Thousands more of our students
receive federal work-study or other
grants or low-interest loans.
These students have skin in the game
as well.
And when they graduate and go on to
develop new housing developments,
create new products, teach in
our schools, care for
our relatives in the hospital or
take a risk and start a business on
their own, they are using their
education not only to improve
their lives, but they
help improve the lives of everyone
in the state of Wisconsin.
Federal Financial Aid has its roots
in the GI Bill that helped our World
War II veterans pursue careers
and higher education
after they returned from the
war.
Over decades, Federal Financial
aid has helped students across our
country obtain a degree.
In Wisconsin, we know our students
use those degrees not only
for the betterment of themselves,
but also to improve their
communities and Wisconsin's
economy.
Well, that is my privilege to
introduce a few students who are
with us today from UW-Madison,
and they are a testament to how
federal financial aid unlocks
educational opportunities.
Zephyrine Zagudno moved to
the United States 14 years
ago and is a Wisconsin resident.
She is a rising senior majoring
in French and is Pell Grant
recipient.
Thank you for being here today.
Leah Kramer is from Beloit and is
a biochemistry major who is working
through college and is also
a Pell Grant recipient.
Leah, thank you for being here
today. There you are.
And finally,
Izzy Kornoshield is
from Sun Prairie.
She's in her third year of becoming
a doctor of physical therapy
that certainly we are going
to need in the future and it's my
privilege to have Izzy is going to
say a few words on behalf of her
colleagues here today so Izzy.
Hello, I'm Izzy.
I am a third year PT student
here. I did my undergrad at
University of Wisconsin-Lacrosse,
and I'm proud to be here to
represent UW-Madison.
Receiving federal financial aid
enabled me to pursue my lifelong
dream of becoming a physical
therapist.
I wanted to be a physical therapists
so I could make a difference in
people's lives.
I know that through my work at the
Office of Student Financial Aid, how
Pell Grants can change the course
of other students' lives too.
And they open up opportunities for
people who may never have
had opportunities like this without
it.
I want to ensure the same
opportunities are provided to
students, to future students,
because I know how life-changing
these opportunities can be.
Thank you.
Hi, I'm Eric Folkamer, I am the
president of the Wisconsin
Association of Independent Colleges
and Universities, we represent
22 institutions and
53,000 students.
Wisconsin faces a shortfall
of approximately 12,500
college educated workers each
year to fill jobs.
Now is the time to increase
college access to low income
students through the various federal
financial aid programs such
as the Pell Grant.
In the most recent reporting year,
more than 10,600 of
our 53,000 students at
Wisconsin's private colleges
received the Pell Grant, making
up 29 percent of our undergraduate
student population.
Pell Grants create more access for
students to attend colleges and
universities, and
who better to share their experience
than college students who receive
Pell grants? You've heard from some
today.
We also have a student with us
today from the private colleges.
We have a May 2025
Edgewood College graduate,
Liv Springer.
She graduated with a bachelor's in
education and a minor in psychology.
Liv plans to attend graduate school
to obtain a master's in Education
at UW-Superior in
the counseling clinical mental
health track.
She will tell us about the
importance of her Pell Grant.
The Pell Grant allowed me the
relief and the gratitude to be able
to continue my studies without
having to worry about how I was
going to fund them.
I already work two jobs
and without the Pell grant I would
have had to pick up a third.
That would absolutely have taken
away from my
ability to study with my
full-time course load.
I took five classes in the fall
and that really would have put a
damper on my grades that semester.
Thanks to the grant, I was able to
dedicate adequate time to
my studies allowing me to remain on
track for my goals to attend
graduate school starting this
summer, helping me on my way
to a fulfilling career in mental
health care.
More than two-thirds of our
graduates from Wisconsin's private
colleges stay in Wisconsin after
graduation, filling high-demand
jobs in Wisconsin's largest
companies, fueling our state's
economy, and serving as a
driving force for Wisconsin's
workforce readiness and
vitality.
Taken together, the proposals
contained in the bill that was
passed this morning would have
a devastating impact on students
and the institutions that
serve them.
This bill would significantly
restrict student opportunities,
increase costs for students,
and reduce the ability of colleges
and universities to fulfill
their educational missions.
At a time of critical need for more
doctors, nurses,
engineers, and teachers, especially
in the rural and other underserved
areas of our state, creating
barriers to completion runs counter
to bipartisan workforce development
goals.
At this point, we will be happy
to your questions.
Some elected leaders
argue that instead of
bolstering federal money
for financial aid,
colleges and universities should
focus on cutting their
overall tuition costs.
What's your response to that?
Sure, and I'll let my colleagues
jump in also.
At the private colleges,
we have to cover our expenses
with tuition and philanthropy.
And so we keep our tuition as low
as possible.
For every $1 of federal
or state aid that comes to our
students, more than $24 of those
dollars come from the institution
itself through the scholarships that
we provide. So we are doing
everything we can to keep costs
down.
The majority of our students are not
eligible for a Pell Grant or for
federal financial aid of that sort,
but for those who need it, it is
crucial and essential.
Others wanna answer that?
It's our mission at the Wisconsin
Technical College System to keep our
tuition as low as possible.
For occupational coursework, tuition
is around $150 per credit.
And we absolutely depend
on Pell Grants, other financial
aid, and our hardworking students to
be able to cover that portion of our
costs.
It's been a longstanding policy of
my board and of the system as a
whole to keep tuition as low as
possible.
And what funding we do receive,
we keep in
the classroom.
We keep our overhead as
low as possible and
we do a great job.
Ninety-three percent of our.