One of the hotter issues surrounding the Tennessee governor’s race deals with the state’s use of lottery funds from the Tennessee Education Lottery. This lottery was formed as a way to help fund higher education in the state of Tennessee, but has recently veered from the program’s initial goals. In recent years lawmakers have added several other uses for the lottery’s money which includes funding for pre-kindergarten, afterschool programs, and school energy efficiency upgrade grants. These additional programs have drained hundreds of millions of dollars from the scholarship program that the lottery was first developed to fund, possibly causing future cutbacks to the program.
Last year alone the state’s education lottery was able to award more than 46,000 students Hope scholarships in the amounts of $4,000 for a 4 year school and $2,000 for a 2 year school. In addition to these students another 25,000 low income students were given funds to help pay for their college educations.
With more and more students realizing the importance of a college degree and going on to a post-secondary institution, the state’s lottery funds are being stretched thin. Add in the fact that older students who may have been out of high school for several years are also going back to school in order to help their chances of landing a better job and you have some of the highest demand for state scholarship assistance in recent years.
Since Tennessee is trying to place an added emphasis on receiving a college degree for its residents, it is vitally important that the state uses the education lottery’s funds appropriately. By providing students with extra income to help pay their college tuition more Tennesseans will be able to afford a college education, therefore increasing the likelihood of landing a job in the future. Cutting the amount given in the form of college scholarships from the state education lottery would be detrimental to the overall plan of Tennessee lawmakers looking to improve the level of education of their citizens.
