The KTEC site would present undue hardship for students who would have to drive from that campus to the main campus to take their core academic classes. It would represent an average of 12 miles one-way travel distance from the KTEC site to the main campus. With the price of gas hovering around $4 a gallon, that would be asking those students to spend $8 a day on average. If you do the math that is asking those PTE students to spend on average an extra $500+ per semester to be in a trades program, compared to the programs that are offered on campus.

Besides that fact does it seem fair to you to just single out one group of students? We are a part of NIC too. We pay and learn here just like any other students in any other program, and we deserve to be on campus and not isolated out in the middle of nowhere. We don't care if we have good land out there or if it would suit the needs of the college the best because it would help with taxes, or for whatever other reasons. For once think about the students and not yourselves. All of you actually get paid and have money. We on the other hand have to pay to learn and have no more to give for extra expenses like driving out to KTEC. So how about doing what the students want for once: use your hearts, help all of us students, and be compassionate.

The main concerns that we have with putting the new Technical Education Building out on the prairie is time and money for the students and instructors. We keep hearing the argument that putting the new building off campus is the best thing for the community and we cannot see why. Our program barely affects the community. The welding program right now is off campus, and you would be amazed at how many people don't even know that the college has a welding program. The community may pay taxes that help out the college, but how can they care about us if they don't even know we exist? This building is supposed to be a place of learning for students. It is supposed to be for us, and the most beneficial place for us to be would be on campus where we have all the amenities that we need. Is it really fair that we have to drive so far from our school because somebody says that it would be better? Tell any student that you are going to move their program 20 minutes off campus and see how they react. The trade's students already have to pay more for college than a regular full-time student. It's not fair to ask for more money out of us for gas expenses and time, when we can barely afford it already. It's one thing to have to spend money on gas to get paid at work. It's entirely different to fork out gas and pay for the same work. For once, do something right by the students.

Another concern as students is will our core classes like English, Math and ATEC (classes that are required for the Technical Certificate) be offered out on the prairie campus or will we have to drive to the main campus to take these classes? If so great, but what if the building is built in sections over a five-year time period. Will those students who are out there first have to go to the main campus to take these course? No other program on campus whether it be an academic or technical course should have to drive to a different location to take a course for the program they are in. Please put the PTE building on the main campus where it belongs.

When we went to the April 15 meeting there was a lot of talk about doing what is ethically right. Our question is that one trustee is also on the KTEC board. Is it ethically right for him to vote on the buildings' location when one of the proposed sites is out by KTEC? Also, he already publicly stated his position and thoughts on where he wants the campus to be, and being a board of trustee member shouldn't his decision be based on all the info that is presented and still yet to be heard?

We would hope that the NIC board of trustees would not be biased in their decisions and instead do what they feel would be in the best interest of the students who will be affected by this change.

Ryan Brown, Tarnell Brown and Bob Taylor are students at North Idaho College.