FAFSA application fail caused 'irreparable harm' to class of '24 | Letters to the Editor

The Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) form was vastly simplified this year, going from over a hundred questions to as few as 10. This simplification was signed into law three years ago to encourage more low-income families like mine to file. This would help more families know that they could afford to send their children to college.

Last year the U.S. Department of Education asked for and received an extension for the implementation of the new, simplified form.

Even when the data becomes available, colleges will need time to process the data and create financial aid packages.

Life is unpredictable. COVID-19, for instance, was unforeseeable. The FAFSA fiasco, however, was predictable. The education department had years to make changes to the FAFSA form. It had one job: vastly simplify an already-existing form so that more low-income students could have the option to get a college degree.

The government has failed these students in such a stunning way that the ripple effects will be seen for decades. The class of 2024 has been irreparably harmed by the FAFSA fiasco.

April Bucknell

Troy

Mishandling of funds by Ann Arbor school district is not a small error

I read a recent op-ed piece about how AAPS made a $14 million accounting error. ("Ann Arbor Public Schools is short $25 million. How did we get here," Detroit Free Press, April 22.)

One can hardly say that $14 million is an accounting error. Miscalculating $50 is an error when I balance my checkbook, but $14 million is an epic misclassification of funds verges on criminal negligence. Does the AAPS have checks and balances to catch these types of errors? (Editor's note: AAPS officials say they are facing a total $25 million budget shortfall.)

What is the Ann Arbor Board of Education doing to prevent such errors in the future?

As a parent of an AAPS student who attended virtual classes at Huron High throughout the pandemic, I can tell you I and many other parents voiced our concerns about the quarantine, and rejected the learning-at-home concept via Zoom and Chromebooks. All of which fell on deaf ears by the superintendent, principal and Ann Arbor Board of Education.

Now it has come back to bite the board and AAPS because families left in droves during the pandemic and teacher layoffs are imminent. These poor decisions made behind closed doors have consistently caused the AAPS district to lose pupils and funding, as well as the faith of the community.

Going forward, we tax paying citizens deserve a full accounting, an audit and an explanation of how a $14 million “error” happened, what is being done to correct it so it never happens again, how it will be rectified and why it took so long for us to hear about it through an op-ed piece in the Detroit Free Press instead of from the district. Full disclosure and transparency are necessary to right this wrong.

Sarah Mccallum

Ann Arbor

Trump staring at the eclipse is a reflection of his presidency

While deciding who to support in the upcoming presidential election, and in light of last Monday’s solar event, it is fitting to think back to the eclipse of 2017. ("President Biden appears to poke fun at Trump's viral 2017 eclipse moment," Detroit Free Press, April 8.)

One of this year’s candidates famously stared directly into the sun without protective glasses while he was president. This ignoring of traditional wisdom and expert advice was not a one-time flub by that president. ("Sigh. Yes, staring directly at the sun without glasses is dangerous, experts say," Detroit Free Press, April 10.)

That is how he lives his life. It is how he ran his first presidency and would operate in his next, should he win again. Risking his personal well-being with reckless behavior is bad enough, but we can’t afford to let a man be the leader of the free world again who has such a disregard for scientific facts.

David Cash

Detroit

Reintroduced billionaire tax bill will help us all

Elizabeth Warren has reintroduced Senate Bill 510, an ultra-millionaire tax from three years ago. It would impose a 2% tax on wealth over $50 million dollars and a 3% tax on wealth over $1 billion.

This would minimally affect 100,000 households in our country of 340 million people, or only 0.05% of the population, however it would raise over $3 trillion dollars over the next 10 years, which would help everyone in our country tremendously.

I am not an economist, political scientist or pollster, but I can’t imagine any of those experts finding problems with this.

Representatives from both political parties publicly state that the extremely wealthy should pay their fair share. They are not going to lose any votes from average Americans when supporting this type of legislation.

And as far as polling the American people, you’d be hard pressed to find a result that does not favor a wealth income tax.

The wealth gap has been growing at an increasingly fast rate over the last 50 years. The axiom the rich get richer has never been more true than it is in 2024.

The economy would still thrive, capitalism would still be king and those multi-millionaires would still do better relatively than the rest of us. The rest of us would have just a little more of our country’s great wealth to put towards programs that benefit all of society.

Bryan Chase

Huntington Woods

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This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: FAFSA application fail, Ann Arbor school deficit, new taxes | Letters