La Voz

(Left to right): Olga Ardulov, Sung Kim, Loriza Sasur, Asif Ahmed, Thomas Guffey, Dan Sealana and Robert Erdei

There's something to look out for here at De Anza College, and it's called "pay to stay." Pay to stay is the requirement for all students to pay for their classes shortly after registration. To many, the system makes sense. Students used to register into classes and never pay for them, even staying an entire quarter without paying. Therefore, De Anza administrators decided to take action and make payment due within five days of registration.

If a student doesn't pay by the deadline, he or she is automatically dropped from all classes, thus students now have to literally pay to stay. It makes well enough sense on paper, until one realizes that there are hardly any other colleges that follow such stringent financial rules. Major institutions in the area like San Jose State University allow its students much more flexibility in paying for classes, and even sister college Foothill gives students more time to pay their fees.

Financial flexibility is, in fact, one of the reasons why students choose De Anza College over somewhere else.

Some might wonder how a pay to stay system would negatively affect students. After all, students are still paying the same amount, they just need to pay it earlier. Those who work know that time is money. In one month, a student may be able to pay some, but not all of the registration fees, needing additional time to earn money to pay the rest.

The pay to stay system punishes students who don't have all of their fee money right away, and seems to be impacting overall admissions to De Anza College.

The only other option for students, who don't already qulaify for the BOG fee waiver, is to apply for the tuition installment payment plan, but even then students must have an acceptable credit history.The system needs to be changed, at least extending the deadline for payment. If students still don't pay within the deadline, then those students simply won't receive credit for the time spent in their classes.

It is counter productive for De Anza College to make it that much harder for students to learn. Just say "nay" to pay to stay.

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