Students protest for 12 hours outside the president’s office against the $440 credit hour fee
Lucy Merriman, freshman theatre design major, organized a 12 hour protest against the Ambition Penalty outside president Lester Lefton’s office in the Kent State University library. Photo by Sam Verbulecz.
The cost of ambition at Kent State? $3,520 to be an honors student, $10,560 to take a minor and $44,000 if a student wants a second major.
“And if you’re not from Ohio, it’s all double the cost,” said Lucy Merriman, freshman exploratory major.
That’s what students’ signs read as they sat outside Kent State’s executive offices on the second floor of the library for 12 hours Monday to protest the $440 credit hour fee that goes into effect fall semester for each credit a student takes over 17 credit hours.
Merriman led Monday’s protest, which started at 9 a.m. and ended at 9 p.m. She said her goal was to talk to students and administrators about making changes to the credit hour fee and to encourage students to sign an online petition against the fee. She said about 500 students signed the online petition.
“[The protest is] all about trying to get awareness from the students,” said Miranda, a senior history major who did not want to give her last name. “Not many students heard about it except honors students, so I hope it can make an impact.”
Merriman said she managed to talk briefly to President Lester Lefton about her group’s concerns, but she said he told her the “fees are not targeting any specific group, and they’re fair for everyone” before going to his office. She said some members of her group hope to follow up and schedule a meeting with Lefton later this week.
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Iris Harvey, vice president of university relations, stopped by Monday morning to talk to student protesters about the fee. She said the $440 fee plateau is meant to put Kent State in line with other institutions to “raise the appropriate revenue.”
“We’re most concerned with being able to keep high quality facilities for students,” Harvey said. “In order to do that, we need some funding source. The fee is a chance to have a more equitable pricing structure.”
Harvey said Kent State students can attend full-time with only 11 credit hours, whereas most other Ohio universities consider 12 credit-hours full-time. She said the average course load for a Kent State student is 13.5 credit hours.
However, some students like Wesley Doucette, junior art history major, said they wanted to petition against the fee anyway. He said he was one of the first students to sign the petition.
“I felt physically ill when I heard that since I’m currently taking 24 credit hours and plan on doing the same until I graduate,” he said.
Merriman said a different group plans to host a similar protest Thursday in the same place.
Contact Megan Wilkinson at [email protected].