This year presents all of us at SUNY Oswego with great challenges posed by the New York State budget. The State University of New York and SUNY Oswego are facing the most serious state funding cuts that have been proposed in decades. It is particularly alarming that Governor Paterson proposes to take 90 percent of the $310 Spring 2009 tuition increase, charged to students and their families and put it in the State of New York’s general fund. This amounts to an unfair tax on our students and their families. This action, together with $2.5 million in budget cuts to our campus this year will seriously impact our operations and the Upstate New York economy.

We urge you to write your legislator to request that no more cuts are made to SUNY and that the funds from the recently approved tuition increase remain on campus. In just one minute you can send a letter to your legislator and voice your support for our students and one of New York’s premier educational institutions and economic engines.

This is a critical moment for SUNY Oswego—the budgetary decisions made today will shape the college and our region for many years. You can help reverse the state reductions to our campus and ensure that the college has the essential resources necessary to meet the ever-growing need for affordable, high-quality education while helping grow our knowledge-based, high-technology economy right here in Central New York.

The legislator you have elected to represent you and your family needs to hear from you directly. Let them know that higher education matters to you and that you want them to stop cutting SUNY and raiding student paid tuition and fees to help fix New York State’s budget deficit. I ask you to share your stories about the personal and societal benefits of public higher education with friends, neighbors, colleagues, and particularly your elected officials.

Your advocacy can be part of a promising solution to help the state emerge from threatening economic circumstances with renewed ambition and hope for the future for all New Yorkers.