There’s a lot of talk in Wichita these days about how to keep local youths from leaving for college, jobs and life. Here’s an idea that seems a lot like bribery, but surely would show results: a local variation on the four-year, $20,000 “Hoosier Hope Scholarships,” proposed by Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels, for use at any private or public college in that state. The catch for recipients: The money would have to be repaid if you left the state sooner than three years after graduation. The catch for lawmakers: Daniels would pay for the scholarships by outsourcing Indiana’s lottery for 30 years, a deal that would bring in $1 billion upfront and annual payments later.
Posted by Rhonda Holman
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22 Comments
Anything that rolls lottery funds out of the “Kansas Free Enterprise Fund” or whatever they call their socialism for the rich program is a good thing.
Probably won’t make much of a dent though.
People want to live in cities. If they didn’t want to live in cities, they wouldn’t be moving there.
PizzaHut moved its headquarters from Wichita to Dallas because Wichita was “too small” a city.
Good point – anything that moves the Lottery money from where it is being squandered now is a better plan. But, sadly, $20 grand ain’t gonna’ get it anymore. How about a “sliding scale”?
$20,000 = 3 years$30,000 = 4 years$50,000 = 5 years$100,000 = 10 years
There would have to be some exceptions carved in their for family health emergencies, etc., but, on the other side of the coin, say somebody opted for the $100,000/10 year option, and 6 years down the road, some company wanted that person badly. The company could buy out the pro-rated repayment, just like professional athletes moving from one team to another.
Unfortunately, the scholarship idea presupposes that there will be jobs in Kansas for the graduates. Not necessarily true, at least in all fields. As I posted on Friday, without the jobs present, the graduate will move to the job, and repay the money. At least, that’s how I see it.
Well think the ideal is great, however, there has to be a viable plan in place for maximum results over a period of time. Meaning the plan should’nt consist of just paying for tution without the payee having no commitment, to stay in wichita, upon completion of college. Maybe possibly having those who have degrees in business to have a start-up or entrepreneur committment. Where the last year the monies would be rolled into a program, that would require them to be in wichita for an additional 3 to 5 years. This way those who graduate will remain in the city. This would generate new economy and social lifestyles, since wichita has been infamous for not having either of the things mentioned.The truth of the matter is that the success of any city is it’s ability to provide options for the young graduate and the entrepreneur, with simplicity of opportunities. Something wichita has got to envolve into, before they loose all the big name corporations, that have provided that source of economic stability.
Yes, Vaughn, it does presuppose the existence of the jobs that may or may not exist. But, I think we need to be careful not to “throw the baby out with the bathwater”. A lot of “tweaking’ is mandatory before this could get off the ground.
2Rel: Your thought presupposes the desire of all educated people to be the boss — to run the show. I think statistically you would find the opposite to be true, especially in the scientific fields.
rm, I agree there is much ‘tweaking’ to be done before such a plan gets off the ground.
Capn, IIRC, a reason Pizza Hut gave for moving its international headquarters to Dallas was the availability of international flights so its people had options for needed travel.
I can just see all those aircraft engineering graduates having to wait in Kansas for 3 years on unemployment until they can go to Seattle for a job, just because they finished school at the wrong time.
A tweak: as long as repayment terms are not too onerous then if a person has to leave to get a good job he just pays it back over time. Thus there is an incentive to stay but not unreasonable barriers to moving on.
Ben, that is a needed tweak, and one I would hope would be a part of the entire thing, should this get past the ‘talking’ stage.
In rereading the header, I noted some thought of limiting this to Wichita. I do not think such a thing could ever occur if the Legislature was, in concert with the Governor, to pass such a law. If, however, the City Council was to enact an ordinance to this effect, then there could be some tie to Wichita proper; but, then, how to fund it?
I agree VT – why discriminate against people in Goddard, Pratt, etc
I missed that … it would have to be state wide. That’s clearly a no-brainer. But paraphrasing both of you, the number one issue has to be jobs — quality jobs with appropriate compensation — we do not need a well educated scientist asking, “Do you want fries with that?” I remember geologists working in full-service gas stations when gas was twenty cents per gallon.
Just got “botted”, again. And I didn’t even mention “F**k”! And had to to “renew” the page to even post. What a piece of junk!
No, No, do NOT outsource the lottery money. Keep it all just for that one use. Or better yet here in Kansas get the gambling going and dedicate the money to it. This is the way Georgia has done already. That is where Indiana got the name..the GA scholarships are called HOPE scholarships and are good for any student in GA that has a B average. They get to go to school FREE. But putting a requirement that they stay here is interesting..but don’t know about being viable.
And watch this “selling” of ongoing money generating ideas in states. Some states have sold their interstate highways to foreign companies to turn them into TOLL roads and keep the money of 75 years.
If ANY KS legislator proposes the insane idea of selling off the roads, we need to hunt them down like a dog.
Never EVER give a politician access to a large amount of cash all at once. It will fart and blow out the window into some complete crap-shoot…or worse they will put it into some program that will then require continued funding. Like continually kissing the NEA frog…without it ever turning into the better results prince.
If students are required to “live within the state” for 3 years, here is what you will end up with- lots of students will take the free tuition at places like WSU and colleges in western Kansas and they will promptly move to Johnson and Wyandotte counties and, in many cases, actually work in Missouri- as many folks in Johnson and Wyandotte do. So Kansas pays the fare and Missouri benefits. The fact is that the rest of the state- even Wichita- has limited jobs for college graduates. Most of the jobs in Wichita are blue collar factory jobs which college graduates don’t care to do. I know because I grew up on Wichita and that is why we don’t live there now.
Kev, you hit the nail on the head with your post about grads living in JoCo and (possibly) Wyandotte County, while being gainfully employed in Missouri.
Thus, again, there must be the jobs here in Wichita and the western part of the state to keep the graduates in-state, otherwise any “Hope” scholarship such as this is doomed to abject failure.
Sort of a chicken and egg conundrum; the area needs a populace with the appropriate education to attract the employers, but there must be employers to attract the graduates.
Wichita is not “too small a city”. It just has “too small jobs” and “too small an airport” We live in Atlanta and the population here is 416,474 while the population of Wichita is 347,600. Not that big of a difference. But the airport in Atlanta handles thousands of flights every day to all over the world and the economy is great for college grads here. And it isn’t just the weather. Chicago and Seattle are both booming and having lived in both, I can tell you that you’d much prefer winter in Wichita! Wichita needs to get out of the “small town” mind and think big. Build a new airport and make it big! If you build it, they will come!
Kev: Your ideas are well taken — your numbers suck. METRO Atlanta vs. METRO Wichita. No contest. Metro Atlanta is a ghetto, with office buildings, here and there. I don’t know who, or why, you’re trying to bullshit here, but an airport ain’t gonna1 change it.
No matter what anyone wants, Wichita is never going to be a real big league city. It just isn’t going to happen, just as Kansas is not going to reach the stature of Missouri or Colorado.
You can debate whether we SHOULD desire to reach those levels – that is true – but the fact is that Wichita and Kansas are what they are – flyover territory.
We can tweak the equation to improve the situation, but nothing is really going to change.
JoCo is basically a Kansas City suburb. The rest of Kansas is stuck with what we have – no real appeal to entice people to move here in any quantity.
We would be better served improving what we have rather than trying to become Dallas North.
WSC: Kudos. Wichita isn’t even OKC eNorth, let alone Dallas North!!
Wichita is better than OK City by far! Ask anybody in OK City “where would you like to live?” and they will always say “anywhere but here”.
Kev – the population difference between Wichita and Atlanta is much greater when you consider the SMSA – about a half-million here and about 2 million or so in Atlanta.
Yhe key thing needed in Wichita is more quality employment. That will not only keep WSU grads here but attract grads from elsewhere.
I did some researching and for those who consider kansas as the “flyover” zone, will be shock to know that in the next 15 to 20 years wichita will become heavily populated, due too the shift in the way people are going to desire to live (i.e. in a small town-city feeling). Think about it those who have lived in wichita over the last 20 yrs can see the growth of the city.Places of the city, that were barren in 86-87(13th&Greenwich) are now spacious neatly rowed homes and commerical stores. Demonstrating that wichita is on the population curve of the new century. The only think that is missing is the opportunity with employment. it is true wichita is a blue collar city, that needs to envolve into a techincal and cutting edge city.