For the second semester in a row, nearly 18,000 students wandered onto the campus of Bakersfield College back in August, a substantial increase over years past, most of them pinning their hopes and dreams for a better future on receiving an education.

Those people arrived to find a 14 percent overall reduction in classes offered. Also, students this semester were asked to fund a bit more of the cost of their own education by way of a $6 per unit fee increase. For a 15 unit schedule, it amounts to an extra $90 out of the student’s pocket. Welcome to college.

BC students are not alone in this. In fact, we have it pretty good. Cerritos College in Norwalk reduced classes by 20 percent, and in San Diego, the overcrowded community college district turned away nearly 18,000 students, the entire student population of our campus, this semester.

Don’t for a moment think that this is the fault of college administrators. There is not some administrator sitting in a darkened office, illuminated by a single shaft of moonlight, wringing his hands in sinister glee at the plight of BC students. The money just simply isn’t there.

According to California Community Colleges Chancellor Jack Scott’s website, community colleges in California are looking at $840 million in budget cuts through 2010. Additionally, community colleges only received $37 million of the expected $130 million of federal funds.

It seems California sat down to balance its checkbook and came up a little short. There was an election back in May in which the governor and state lawmakers asked the voters if they could borrow some pocket change from the future to make up for the $42 billion, yes, billion with a “B” and nine zeros, budget deficit. The voters politely told them no with the exception of Kern County, which pretty much screamed no at the top of its lungs.

So in a way, one could make a good argument that our current situation is simply what we deserve for allowing our representatives to write so many bad checks over the years, and then suddenly telling them to stop. We need to live on ramen noodles and macaroni and cheese for a while until we get back on our feet.

But on the other hand, we need to make sure that our priorities are in order when it comes to what we trim out of the budget. Education literally is the only hope we have for a prosperous future.

When we look at the things we truly need to succeed, education is very near the top of the list. If our state is still spending a single dollar to subsidize the housing, dairy, or film industries, or even to pave roads for that matter, it should not be cutting spending on education. We should not care if we are walking on dirt paths as long as we are walking toward a school.

Ignorance never cured a disease, it never put a man on the moon, fed the hungry, and for that matter ignorance never balanced a budget. Education is the only cure for ignorance.