Bill's interview pt.4

Bill's interview pt.4

Education
University of Connecticut

This is Part 4 of Bill Potvin's personal oral history. He discusses being a student in the late 1960s and makes comparisons to being a student today.

Colleen Duffy

Personal Recollections from Bill Potvin

CCSU and Dr. Juan Coronado

04/23/2022

Bill Potvin

Video

English

Interview

Andy Strand

Bill Potvin

CCSU

and they’re just entering their 70s too so you can't keep going on it's very physical work still. I did a route yesterday. Can you imagine? Jumping in and out of a truck at this age? (Andy: huh!) But I don’t get bitter about it I- you know what the word I use is? Im Blessed that i can do it. I’m still in good shape. (Andy laughs) So blessed is the word. So- and I went to the university of Connecticut by the way.

Andy: okay

Bill: uh and Boy Ill tell you thats one thing I feel sorry for for you young people with student debt and stuff like that. Why has education done this to young people? So pathetic!

Andy: Its money.. Just like everything else, right?

You know when I tell young people that I got a college education at UConn didn’t borrow one penny and my family didn't give me a penny. And they said, well how do you do that? You know how you work in the summer and on the weekends and the tuition was $125 a semester when I started in ‘64 and when I got out it was still um $700 a semester (Andy okay so you could still pay that and buy your books and get an education without going into debt. (Andy: yeah) and now thats history! Its a shame.
Andy: Yeah its crazy
Bill: Its not fair. Its not fair to the young people starting your life off with that kind of debt. Its a huge negative. So im blessed by the fact that I was able to get an education without going into hock?

Andy: Right


Bill: that, THat’s the way it should be if you really believe in the importance of education, which i do very immensely then you should make education available to young people without doing that because there are other models in Europe…

Andy: Like Europe!

Bill: Europe! They’ve got a better answer! Why should there be a banker? Bankers have a loads of ways of making money and student loans shouldn’t be one of them. That's wrong. That’s how I-

Andy: And the thing is it shouldn’t be so expensive!

Bill: No! no.

Andy: I mean it’s crazy students have to pay $20-30,000 a year to pay tuition.

Bill: oh oh and there’s no guarantee that you’ve got anything once you’ve done it. Most- some financial advisors- David Ramsey has a show and he has always told young people, “Don’t do it don't do it you're gonna be you know you're doing something that’s extremely risky you're going into debt with no guarantee with a job. That’s not a good business decision.

Andy: Well you know there are some new schools coming along now and uh they’re bypassing the whole college thing and teaching skills and getting their students jobs. You know. Its like one year two year programs and uh they guarantee you..

Bill: In the technical field.

Andy: yeah the technical field

Bill: Yeah well the technical field is not truly an education. An education is understanding history the arts-

Andy: the liberal arts

Bill: Yeah exactly. If you want everybody to go to a trade school lets not to me that's not the education that used to be the standard thing. Do you understand history? Do you understand different cultures around the world?

3 minutes 10 seconds