Joe Courtney, seen here visitng UConn in April, spoke about the importance of the youth vote on Monday.

Waking The 'Sleeping Giant'

Courtney Stresses Importance Of Students In National Elections

By: Kala Kachmar

Posted: 11/6/07

Youth voters aged 18 to 29, which Rep. Joe Courtney (D-2nd) referred to as the sleeping giant, can have a direct impact on national elections, he said at the Student Union Monday.

UConnPIRG hosted Courtney to recognize the work he did in helping to pass the College Cost Reduction and Access Act - which was a bill signed into law in September that increased federal financial aid spending to $20 billion - the largest increase in financial aid since the G.I. bill in 1944.

The age group is gaining momentum across the country as voter turnout rates continue to grow, Courtney said. The rate is close 50 percent, which is significantly higher than in the past.

"There's no question that there's improvement," Courtney said. "You're flexing your muscles and demanding change."

Courtney recognized that the 900 students, most of whom voted for democrats, helped elect him to Congress in 2006 in the closest election in the country. Courtney beat former Rep. Rob Simmons by 82 out of 241,000 votes, he said.

"Number one: change in Washington is happening," Courtney said. "Number two: you had an impact on that change."

In last year's election, Trea McPherson, a 7th-semester political science major, lead UConnPIRG in getting UConn students to vote.

"It's great that UConn students could make a difference in a national election," McPherson said. "Traditionally, young voters are known for being apathetic."

UConnPIRG, the College Democrats, and USG are working to get people registered to vote in the upcoming February presidential primaries, McPherson said.

"We're starting early this year," he said. "We want to get as many people registered to vote in next fall's presidential election as possible. There is only so much time from when the semester starts to the presidential election."

McPherson also lobbied for the College Cost Reduction and Access Act in Washington, D.C. this past September.

The law increases the Pell Grant, which is a grant that is primarily given to students from lower-income families, from $4,050 to $5,400 over the next five years, said Jean Main, director of financial aid at UConn.

Interest rates for the Stafford student loan will decrease from 6.8 percent to 3.4 percent over the next five years.

"There are 6,500 Stafford loan borrowers at UConn," Main said. "Students will save between $1,000 to $1,500 over the life of a loan."

According to Main, there is also a slight change in the way family income is reported. Students and parents will have more of their income protected from being counted as spent toward education, making students eligible for more financial aid.

"That fact that we are under investing in higher education is making it hard for families to pay and as a result, less students are graduating from college," Courtney said. "Seventy-five percent of students in high school expect to get college degrees, but only about one-third actually achieve their goal and it's mostly because of high costs."

We need to make college affordable to produce college graduates who can be competitive in an increasingly global environment, especially with the retirement of the baby boomers, Courtney said.

Courtney is currently working on the Higher Education Reauthorization bill, a federal act that will push colleges to reveal reasons for high tuition increases and will investigate how well colleges manage money, he said. This will be one of his main bills for next year's Congressional session.

Part of the bill would include making preferred lender lists in financial aid offices illegal.

"There are 3,000 student lenders out there," Courtney said. "And when students get a list of one or two from their college, it's not fair."

The bill will also provide comparisons of different college costs for families that might not understand how college pricing works, Courtney said.

"Often families get scared away from the sticker price of colleges," he said. "We need to help them look at different school costs and financing options."

One program that would be part of the bill is called Trio, which is a federal program that reaches out to junior high school students from families who haven't gone to college, but have high grades, Courtney said. The program allows these students to gain access to college-prep curriculums.

"The program exists right now on a limited basis," Courtney said. "There are waiting lists and very little funding."

Contact Kala Kachmar at

Kala.Kachmar@UConn.edu.