Tuition free higher education isn’t a radical idea.

Thirty years ago college costs were low and Pell grants, coupled with a summer job, could allow students to graduate debt free.

A college education is the best pathway to a middle-classlife. But the rising cost of tuition is making college more and more inaccessible. Free college will keep our students in state, produce more college graduates, and prevent our students from beginning their careers with student debt dragging them down.

We need to make higher education a public good again.

Without the state aid that once supported students to graduate debt free, a massive national student loan debt crisis.

The student debt crisis is a dead weight on the American economy, topping $1.3 trillion with the average student having $30,000 in debt.

Student debt is keeping students, families from getting ahead. College costs have spiraled, forcing more students and parents to borrow and leaving less and less money for families to put towards buying a house or saving for retirement.

Wisconsin has decreased 22% in state funding per student since 2008

Wisconsin students now average $39,059 in student loan debt when they graduate, and 67% of students graduate with debt.

Now is the time to put an end to chronic underfunding practice of higher education, and invest into our future by ensuring, undergraduate tuition is guaranteed free to all Wisconsin high school graduates at public colleges, universities, or vocational schools.