Response to Madam Geek!

After you have read through the Room for Debate conversations and evaluated them for yourself,

do you agree with your peers’ assessments? Why or why not? Support your position with

evidence from the text(s) and applicable information from your own experience. (100 words

each response)

1st person!

http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2016/01/20/should-college-be-free

The debate topic I have chosen to write about deals with the idea of free college. In this debate

there are six contributors: Andrew Kelly, Sara Goldrick-Rab, Michael Petrilli, Celeste

Carruthers, Nikki Edgecombe, and Deborah Santiago. Each has good points on how free college

tuition should be given, if at all. Some, such as Andrew Kelly and Michael Petrilli, show that

“free” is used very loosely and that the schooling would in fact be paid for, just out of the

pockets of charitable tax payers. The issues brought up by the other four writers are all similar in

nature; that the government should provide, at a minimum, free community college for under-

privileged students seeking higher education. Nikki Edgecombe takes this a step further in

saying that the government should also provide housing, as college is hard enough and providing

a home for one’s self along with the possible care of another could be too much for one to

handle.

In several of the arguments it comes to light that there are already free subsidies out

there that will pay for the education of the less fortunate. They mostly bring up the Pell Grant,

which is exactly that. Free community college is out there in several states, as it is also brought

up, yet it is Andrew Kelly who brings numbers to the debate. He shows the appallingly low

numbers that the community college has as far as graduation is concerned, where over a six year

period, only a third of the lower income students who started in the beginning, had any sort of

degree. That is not to say that the lower income cases were an anomaly, as higher income

students fared only slightly better. Petrilli also brings statistics to the equation, saying that 60

percent of the graduating 12th graders are not ready for college, and must take remedial classes

once they are there. This goes against what advocates of the free tuition preach, as they say it

would encourage more students to enrol. With a majority of these students not ready for college,

we fall on the numbers of Kelly, where no degree is earned and the tax payers have just wasted

money that could be better spent in the school systems themselves.

Of all the debaters, it is Kelly that strikes me as a winner. He seems to use better facts

than the others in order to convey a clear message. He writes from a perspective that makes

sense more to me that all the others, which helps me to side more with him as opposed to any of

the others.

2nd Person!

http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2015/07/13/birth-control-on-demand

The debate that I have chosen to cover is “Birth Control on Demand”. The debate centers on a program in

the state of Colorado that offered teenagers and poor women free intrauterine devices and implants. These

are a long term methods of birth control that requires very little thought after the initial implantation. The

birthrate among teenagers decreased by 40 percent in four years, and the rate of abortions fell by 42

percent. So the central question of the debate is, if access to long term birth control is effective at

reducing unwanted pregnancies, should the government provide it for free and on demand?

Grace-Maria Turner is the president of the Galen Institute, a nonprofit research organization focusing on

free-market ideas for health reform. Her main argument against the government funded long-term

contraception is that it breeds a sense of irresponsibility into young women. Since tax payers are paying

for them to have sex without fear of pregnancy than they are not responsible for the other consequences,

such as sexually transmitted diseases and poor self-image.

Bianca Brooks is a student at Columbia University, a published journalist, and has produced stories for

major news publications. To her, access to birth control is about personal choice and freedom. She also

argues that it makes economic sense because less unwanted pregnancies could lead to a less people being

dependent on welfare and public assistance.

Kinsey Hasstedt is a public policy associate at the Guttmacher Institute, and focuses on publicly financed

family planning programs and immigrants’ access to sexual and reproductive health care.

Ms. Hasstedt’s argument centers on the financial benefits, not only to families but the tax payers, of

publicly funded birth control. The Guttmacher Institute research shows that in 2010, publicly funded

family planning services helped women to avoid 2.2 million unintended pregnancies. This reduced the

strain on the welfare system by approximately 1.5 million new welfare recipients. These services resulted

in a net savings to the federal and state governments of $13.6 billion or $7 for every public dollar spent.

Jeanne F. Mancini is the president of the March for Life Education and Defense Fund. Ms. Mancini

believes that offering intrauterine devices and implants to teenage girls is a disservice to them. Her main

concern seems to be that these forms of birth control do not protect against sexually transmitted diseases

and give girls a false sense of safety. She stresses educating women about monogamous and long term

one partner relationships.

Melissa Gilliam is a professor of obstetrics, gynecology, and pediatrics and is the director of the

Fellowship in Family Planning at the University of Chicago. Her main argument for publicly funded

health care is that access to high-quality health care particularly important for young women with limited

life opportunities. She also stresses the need for patient involvement and understanding in the selection of

the type of birth control that is right for them.

The contributors to this debate vary in age rage and have different political and religious views. A

central theme from all of the contributors is the need and access to quality and comprehensive sexual and

health education for women. Unfortunately, I think most of them went off on tangents that detracted from

what the main focus of the debate. The socioeconomic factors that lead women to be at higher risks for

unwanted pregnancies should be addressed but the most pressing concern is preventing the unwanted

pregnancy in the first place. This would give those women the options and opportunities these debaters

argued for. However, the kind of education they are advocating for, in my opinion, could be used to

address one of the biggest and largely forgotten contributing factors to unwanted pregnancies, proper

usage of birth control. While access to birth control is critical, proper usage of birth control is more

important. Handing a teenage girl a packet of birth control pills without her fully understanding how to

properly use them is equivalent to handing her a bag of condoms with holes poked in them.