In response to the uninspiring letter by John Gelhaus, you have to wonder whose side this guy is on. How can increases in costs for anything be a good thing when the quality gets worse? If these tuition increases were so great for the Iowa universities, why am I not seeing the results as a student?

We now get larger class sizes and fewer sections offered, professors having to make students print their syllabus off a Web site and not being able to hire teaching assistants because their budgets won’t allow it. And some services to students are getting cut because the university cannot afford to keep them operating.

For an in-state student, $600 may not sound like a whole lot more, but what about out-of-state students? They get to pay almost $3,000 more next year. Now how is that fair?

One thing is for sure – I would bet that come re-election time for Gov. Vilsack and the other state legislators, student voter turnout is going to be a lot higher than in years past.

Travis Simpson

Senior

Management information systems