The SMART Grants are Stupid

The new Science and Mathematics Access to Retain Talent (SMART) Grants included in legislation passed by the House of Representatives last week, will, if signed into law by President George W. Bush, set a bad precedent for the nation.

The grants of up to $4,000 would apply only to students majoring in math, science, technology, or a foreign language deemed critical to the national security of the United States. The conditions associated with these grants are highly problematic for both philosophical and practical reasons.

As a matter of principle, the government should not be making normative value judgments about the relative merit of specific fields of study. To declare some skills more important than others and steer the population accordingly threatens the right of American citizens to choose their majors and occupations. At the center of a democratic government is the notion of liberty and choice— the liberty to say what one wishes, to believe what one wishes, to profess what one wishes—all without fear of governmental reproach. In that vein, this legislation should not have the power to effectively make such a normative judgment through its allocation of Federal Pell grants.

Even if the government can justify such legislation in the interest of national security, that interest is undermined by the practical injustice and inefficacy of such a policy. These grants, available only to those students who are eligible for federal Pell grants, will disproportionately affect students from low-income households—those students for whom federal money is the difference between being able to attend college and being forced into the workforce. For these students, declaring the appropriate major may be the ticket to college.

This disproportionate impact flies in the face of the government’s mission to provide educational opportunities to all those who wish to attend college. Universal education is said to be the way to level the playing field and give those from less fortunate circumstances the opportunity to choose and pursue their own destinies. By limiting the SMART grants to only certain specialized subject areas, this legislation coerces financially disadvantaged students to go into these areas in order to pursue a college degree. While the program naturally advantages those who already intended to pursue these subject areas, it discriminates against those students with a desire to major in the humanities or social sciences. As such, it leaves students with the unreasonable choice of entering different or unrelated fields, or simply discarding their hopes of affording college.

In such a way, the grants threaten to lead to a slippery slope, limiting certain fields only to those who can afford them financially. Math and science are specialized fields requiring proficiency with numbers, which not all students may possess. These students should still be able to go to college and pursue their vocational goals—regardless of what field they intend to study and regardless of their financial circumstances.

In addition to this blatant injustice, the SMART grants also fail to resolve the alleged problem of worker shortage in national security and technology-related fields. Because the grants do not necessitate that the student remain in the field after graduation or do government work, this supposed investment in education to increase national security may never come to fruition.

The SMART grants passed by the House of Representatives therefore have been shown to discriminate against low-income students with no clear national gain. The consequences of the legislation therefore threaten the American ideals of access to unconditional secondary education for all and the right of Americans to make their own choices about their interests and vocations. The grants are thus a grievous error.

Reva P. Minkoff ’08, a Crimson editorial editor, is a government concentrator in Pforzheimer House. Ramya Parthasarathy ’09, a Crimson editorial editor, lives in Stoughton Hall.