After Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton suggested a 17-percent increase to state grant funding, St. Thomas students spent their annual Day at the Capitol lobbying and showing support for the budget increase.

About 20 university students spent March 7 at the Minnesota State Capitol to speak with their local senators and representatives regarding the proposed increase of the grant program, a need-based financial aid program for undergraduate students who are Minnesota residents.

“The grant program has been around for about 50 years. It’s been around so long that even I was a state grant recipient,” said Doug Hennes, vice president for government relations and special projects at the university. “It’s an important piece of our financial aid program.”

This year, 1,260 St. Thomas students have state grants. With the average grant totaling to about $4,900, over $7 million of the money St. Thomas receives per year are from state grants.

“If the grant program didn’t exist, the university would have to figure out a way to make up that aid through additional institutional aid or students would have to make it up,” Hennes said.

One of the students who went to the capitol is first-year and Undergraduate Student Government Legislative Affairs Senator Jordy Chavez-Estrada.

“We all have that voice in the back of our heads going ‘Oh my God, how am I going to pay for college?’” Chavez-Estrada said. “I am given state grants, and that not only lets me focus on my studies, but I’m sure it helps a large portion of these students by alleviating stress.”

According to Hennes, the university likes Dayton’s proposal, except that they would rather see the added funds applied differently.

“The state recognizes right now … that students have a responsibility to cover 50 percent of their costs,” Hennes said. “We would like to see more of the money go into reducing the student’s share and family’s share of the cost of education … if they reduced it to 45 percent for example, students would get a larger grant and more students would become eligible.”

To recruit students for Day at the Capitol, emails were sent to all state grant recipients attending St. Thomas. Hennes presented to political science classes as well.

“I think trying to recruit students who are political science majors has turned-out to be a wise move because they’re interested in the subject. They’re interested in politics and government,” Hennes said. “We’ve had students who have gone who aren’t even from Minnesota.”

One such student is St. Thomas sophomore Elizabeth Herge, originally from Appleton, Wisconsin.

“As Doug (Hennes) was pitching to my class, I took my laptop out right then and there and signed up,” Herge said.

Hennes, Chavez-Estrada and Herge all agree that it’s important for state senators and representatives to hear from college students on the issue.

“It’s really important for the representatives, not only to see the students, but to hear their stories and how it impacts them because that’s the most important thing,” Chavez-Estrada said. “It was also an important dialogue for those senators and representatives, because some of them don’t know about the bill.”

Students like Chavez-Estrada and Herge hope that the lobbying done at Day at the Capitol will get a positive response from legislators.

“When the legislators are voting and deciding whether to pass the bill, they don’t really think of the numbers and statistics. They don’t remember that stuff when they’re voting, they remember the faces and the stories of people who have talked to them about it,” Herge said.

According to Hennes, the university should know whether or not the state grant funding has been raised by the middle of May.

“I hope to be able to write those students in two months,” Hennes said, “and say, ‘Hey, your work paid off.”

Maya Shelton-Davies can be reached at shel1181@stthomas.edu