The value of tuition parity
WHEN people suffering from heart attacks show up at one of our hospitals, they are not asked where they are from before being treated. They're not asked whether they were born in the United States. They're not asked to show papers that illustrate their legal status. They are treated the way they should be treated -- with the finest, most appropriate care available.
In a society that is generally prosperous and strives to be nurturing, that is how people should be treated. Why should our education system be any less nurturing than our healthcare system? We should not tell children who have the talent, ambition, and initiative to be accepted at a college that they can't attend because their parents haven't attained legal status.
This is football season. It's political season as well. Sadly but predictably, equal access to education for the college-age children of immigrants has become a political football. Some, desperate to generate passion around a wedge issue, claim that children who've gone to school in Massachusetts for years, earned college-worthy high school records, and want to further their educations should pay a higher tuition than the child sitting next to them -- because their parents don't have green cards.
There are irrefutable, sound business reasons why these students should be welcome at state colleges and universities.
To attract business and industries, we must offer a robust, college-educated workforce. This is particularly true in Massachusetts, where healthcare, technology, and financial services serve as our economic backbone. Alarmingly, Metropolitan Area Planning Council projections show that current trends will yield a shortage of skilled workers by 2030, and a surplus of working-age adults without college degrees. If we fail to fill the pipeline with qualified college graduates, we will not only be unable to attract new business to Massachusetts, we risk losing business -- and well-paying jobs -- to other states.
MassINC reports that as of 2004, one in seven Massachusetts residents was born in another country. That's double the rate of the early 1980s. Fact is, there is a declining population of native-born Massachusetts residents; immigrants have become the principal source of new labor for the state's economy. Without our immigrant population, businesses simply could not grow here.
One simple -- and obvious -- way to make sure we continue to grow a strong labor force is to allow all Massachusetts children to attend our public colleges and universities for the same cost. This is good for the students. But it's also good for the Commonwealth. It will increase tuition revenues up to $2.7 million a year, according to the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation. And this does not include the money the state will save in emergency healthcare costs and other services that a gainfully employed person is much less likely to need. For example, the average earnings of an immigrant college graduate are over $40,000 compared with $14,700 for immigrant high school dropouts.
There are also sound moral, ethical, and social reasons why these kids should take part in the educational system.
Tuition parity for all children is the right thing to do simply because it's the right thing to do. My ancestors, like the ancestors of most Massachusetts residents, did not come to America on the Mayflower. They were immigrants. They were scared, yet determined and ambitious. They believed that a better education for the next generation was the key to every family's success, and they were right. In our own way, we should be opening doors, not slamming them shut, for future generations.
And while America's overall immigration policy and enforcement is continually studied and debated, we must never use even one child as a political pawn to prove a point or, worse still, to try to win an election.
Jack Connors Jr. is chairman of Hill, Holliday and chairman of Partners HealthCare System. 
