Obama Visit

On Wednesday, April 25th, Obama came for the second time since my start at Iowa in Fall of 2009. Both times, I have been able to see him speak, which have been amazing opportunities, especially this past week. I was able to see him speak this time because I volunteered as part of my role interning for the Marketing and Communications for University of Iowa Healthcare. 


He talked about a topic that is on the top of any students' mind that is graduating....paying off student loans! Seeing as I will be graduating in two weeks, this was a very important topic and one that I tried to read up on. As for the promotion of President Obama's speech, it mainly focused around undergradaute loans and raising them to the interest rates at which my loans are already at. I could see why this would be a big deal, because those graduating with their Master degrees, on average earn more than those graduating with their BA.


I am grateful that I have a position lined up after graduation as an Administrative Fellow at a VA hospital in the Chicagoland and hope as the the economy continues to improve, more and more graduates find their way into a successful first position. 


However, being of the public health mind, I just read an update this morning on Huffingtonpost.com that the White House is threatening to veto a plan put forth by House Republicans to reduce student loan interest rates by pulling money from the Prevention and Public Health Fund, a funding stream set aside by the Affordable Care Act (ACA) to support preventative health initiatives across the country. In my mind, this would be devastating to public health measures outlined in the ACA and I would hope any of you that are entering the public health field to always pay attention to the POLICY details before standing behind any decision being proposed and to learn the politics behind statements by either side of the aisle.


~ Ryan