Metro: Temple tuition hike warned over controversy

Temple students during summer session. Rikard Larma for Metro.
Temple students during summer session. Rikard Larma for Metro.

I covered for Metro Philadelphia the political battle between my alma mater Temple University and another alumnus Rep. John Taylor, who is pushing to hold back a $175 million appropriation for the school because of a closed hospital.

Nathaniel Nnadiugwu says he feels like there’s nothing he can do about a political fight between Temple and state lawmakers that threatens to hike his tuition by $5,000.

Read the rest here, or pick up a copy if you’re in the city.

This Page Two story was my second in Metro today. I also had a front page piece. Below see some quotations that didn’t make it in.

Jon DeSantis, a 21-year-old senior, criminal justice major and one of two student body vice presidents

  • They took 3,000 letters to Harrisburg.
  • His student government organization was using social media to promote the possible tuition hike and showing students, even through Facebook, how to contact legislators and offering example sample letters.
  • “I understand the community and Rep. Taylor are upset with the closing of the hospital. He’s upset with job loss, but his proposal is having jobs lost at Temple, so that doesn’t show a clear set of  values
  • “At the end of the day, a hospital closure in Port Richmond doesn’t justify a 45 percent raise in tuition for uninvolved people.”
  • “The students who had nothing to do with this are going to pay for this.”

Read the Temple University announcement to students here, and the Daily News story that broke the news before I got my hands on it here.

Kudos to my former college paper The Temple News for getting the interview with John Taylor that I didn’t get by deadline.

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