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These programs are laudable but piecemeal. We need to solve this problem on a national scale instead of relying on the generosity of elite schools with large endowments, private individuals or a patchwork of state-level programs.

Eventually, we should implement a national program modeled after these programs, which are proving effective at expanding access, especially in low-income communities. In the short term, Congress could expand access by raising the maximum Pell Grant to $5,100 and ease the debt burden by cutting interest rates on student loans in half.

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The most common argument against these simple actions is that we can't afford it. This is simply untrue. We can afford them, but we need to make them a priority.

That means making different choices than the ones we're making now. It means putting the expansion of opportunity ahead of tax cuts for the wealthy. It means using taxpayer dollars more efficiently, by ending the corporate welfare system that funnels billions of dollars in subsidies to banks and lenders when a more efficient lending system exists. According to a conservative estimate from the Congressional Budget Office, we could save $13.4 billion over 10 years if a quarter of American schools switched to the more efficient system.

Lack of money is a legitimate roadblock along millions of students' paths to higher education. It is not a legitimate reason to fail to make America stand for the principles we enshrined in the G.I. Bill.

(Oh, and by the way, congratulations class of 2006! College rules.)

(Elana Berkowitz and Adam Jentleson graduated from Brown (in 2001) and Columbia (2003), respectively. They both work for Campus Progress, the youth division of the Center for American Progress.)

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