On Wednesday, March 25, the Community Engagement Center (CEC) organized for six Macalester students to attend the ‘Day at the Capitol’ event at the Minnesota State Capitol in Saint Paul and meet with state legislators to advocate for higher education.
‘Day at the Capitol’ is an event organized by the Minnesota Private College Council (MPCC), of which Macalester is a part of, to promote private higher education across the state. According to MPCC Advocacy and Communications Coordinator Olivia Brammer, 370 students from 15 private colleges attended this year.
“Students get to advocate for themselves and talk to legislators about important issues like the state [education] grants and its impact on their lives and their campus,” Brammer said. She then added that students are also able to benefit from “[developing] networking skills and [having] opportunities with legislators and with peers from other private nonprofit colleges.”
The focus of the day was the Minnesota State Grant (MSG), a program “which helps Minnesota students from low- and middle-income families to be able to attend the college that best meets their educational needs,” Sara Suelflow ’88, chief of staff for the president and secretary to the Board of Trustees, wrote in an email to The Mac Weekly.
The grant has recently faced uncertainty as the program faces a budget shortfall of roughly $240 million below its stated needs. According to data from the MPCC, 125 Macalester students received the MSG in the 2023-24 academic year, totalling more than $820,000 in awards.
“[The MSG] makes Macalester more affordable for low-income students from the state of Minnesota,” Assistant Director of the CEC Derek Johnson said. “It also supports the overall … budget of Macalester and makes it easier for [the college] to support other students in other places too, if there are some other revenues coming in from the state of Minnesota supporting Minnesota students to come to Macalester.”
Suelflow wrote that support for the MSG aligns with several of Macalester’s other goals that the college works towards with organizations such as the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities.
“A primary focus [of Macalester’s advocacy] is on funding to increase college access,” Suelflow wrote. “[This] includ[es] programs such as the Pell Grant, federal student loans and federal student work-study.”
Johnson, however, emphasizes that the event is primarily part of the CEC’s effort to promote student involvement in the political process.
“From us, the Community Engagement Center, what’s important … is that we want students to be able to get to know elected officials and to advocate for whatever it is that they care about,” Johnson said. “So we are not … going there as Macalester College trying to influence it.”
The event this year takes place amid repeated attacks on higher education by the Trump administration and a projected shortfall in Minnesota’s general budget, raising concerns over the future of the program and of the students receiving the grants.
“We have a Democratic governor, obviously, but then we have an entirely split state legislature,” Johnson said. “So it does mean that, in all honesty… not a lot is going to pass. There’s not a lot of bipartisan support for a lot of issues right now.”
Despite these concerns John Manning ’90, MPCC director of marketing and communications, asserts the value of the opportunity that ‘Day at the Capitol’ provides to students and the importance of personal advocacy in state legislatures.
“I think facilitating opportunities for students to speak to legislators, usually from their home districts, is a great way for policymakers to understand the impact of the state grant program and to hear first hand why new investments in the program are important … to constituents and real world people,” Manning said. “It’s not [an] abstraction when a lawmaker is talking to a student.”
Luke Kraemer ’28, a Macalester student who attended the event, reflects that the event provided him with a new perspective on state politics.
“We only ended up meeting with one of the elected representatives, but [I gained] just the simple experience of seeing [that] they’re human,” Kraemer said. “They’re able to be spoken to and reasoned with and … influenced in a way that could … have a real impact. And even more so, to simply be around other students … [who are] so incredibly articulate and knowledgeable — it’s inspiring.”
Kraemer also emphasized the importance of engaging with the political system more broadly as a necessary way to effect change.
“I would say it is extraordinarily important, and I would even say it is, to a certain degree, your duty as a citizen to be engaged … and not just engage, but also make an effort to learn,” Kraemer said. “I think it’s not a choice you can make. I think it is a duty as a Macalester student, and as a U.S. citizen and as a Minnesota resident to be engaged.”
