I am a non-traditional student.

My wife has worked at Syracuse University for 11 years. She has always spoken well of the staff and administration for whom she works. From time to time I have volunteered to help out with events her department has held in order to reach out to students who are considering studying abroad. It has been a pleasure to see the teamwork and satisfaction that the staff in her department enjoys through their successes helping students achieve their goal of studying abroad.

I have been taking classes for the past four years and am working toward earning my BSSW degree and ultimately my MSW in social work. It has taken quite some time, one to two classes per semester, to get to the point where I am considered a senior. I have been on the dean’s list for the past six semesters, which I’m told is quite a feat considering I work full time and we are raising a teenager and a preteen. Fulfilling my lifelong dream of becoming a social worker is possible only because I’m able to attend classes under the remitted tuition benefit. My plan is to continue on, earning my master’s degree so I can make a difference right here in the community where I have lived for the past 46 years. My mother attended SU back in the 1930s, and her dream was to see me ‘walk’ at an SU commencement. She is no longer with us, but every time I walk by the School of Music, the college where she studied, I think of her and am proud to be a part of the community where her dream still lives and thrives inside of me.

I have become quite troubled however, by the proposed changes to the current benefits package offered by SU to its faculty and staff. In an age where scholarship is both cultivated and encouraged, it seems this is a step backward for those who have made a choice to become part of the SU learning community. One of the reasons I returned to school to earn a degree was so that I could then use my ‘insights to incite change’ in the greater Syracuse community. There are many, just like me, who have come so far, studied so hard, learned so much and set their sights so high, and are now shuddering to think it will all come to end because these proposed changes will take effect before we have reached our goal of graduating from SU.

These changes, along with the increased costs of health care insurance for a married couple with children and my children approaching college age, would make it virtually impossible for me to continue my studies at SU. I have worked in the nonprofit sector throughout my professional life and know the challenges of budgetary constraints, funding shortfalls and sustainability issues. Therefore, I ask Chancellor Cantor and the university trustees to rethink these proposed changes and consider the effect it will have on current non-traditional students, the faculty and staff of SU, and the faculty and staff of ESF. Additionally, be mindful of the effect it will have on the goodwill and reputation that this establishment of higher learning has worked so long and so hard to secure with the city, county, and the other colleges and universities with which it partners. Mark S. Hard Human Ecology Senior