On Feb. 1 in Regina, nearly 200 students took to the streets to protest the increasing costs of post-secondary education. And while I support the idea of highlighting the costly burden of a university education, I believe my fellow students’ efforts are misplaced.

You can attack the premier and the prime minister all you like, but the general anti-government, anti-Harper and anti-Wall sentiment isn’t going to help the cause.

Do I wish my classes were more affordable? Of course I do. I strongly advocate for disassociating a student’s family income, personal income and assets from student loan applications in an attempt to make student loans more accessible and, therefore, make university more accessible. But I’m not going to stomp my feet and publicly decry the premier of Saskatchewan for not caring about students.

Tuition has gone up 11 per cent in the last three years under Brad Wall’s Saskatchewan Party government and there has been no comparable increase in federal student aid or funding. Indeed, things could be a lot better. Despite this fact, I am still grateful that any level of government is willing to lend me any amount of money to finance my education. If student loans were not an option, I would not be at university.

My student loans are not a maxed-out credit card with a ridiculous amount of interest piling up every month. They amount to debt I will be able to pay off eventually. Plus, there are many bursaries, awards and scholarships available to university students, which I’m sure all the students who were at this protest apply for every academic year.

Jonathan Hamelin of the Regina Leader-Post reported the students chanting “Public education is under attack. What do we do? Unite fight back!” and “We got to beat, back, the Harper attack, we got to beat, back, the Harper attack.”

When did Prime Minister Stephen Harper start attacking public education? One can argue that the Prime Minister and the Conservative Party of Canada are attacking a lot of things, but I don’t think public education is one of them.

One could argue the prime minister and his Conservative government are attacking the functioning of Parliament and committees, the ability of MPs to access information, political opponents through malicious advertisements, the budget of the Parliamentary Budget Officer, parliamentary conventions, Elections Canada, public funding for political parties, the provinces on health care funding and democracy in general. I understand that inaction is action but if the federal student aid funding has merely stagnated, the worst the prime minister is guilty of is ignoring public education.

Ultimately, this is why the Feb. 1 protests will garner no attention, nor result in any changes in the cost of tuition. You can attack the premier and the prime minister all you like, but the general anti-government, anti-Harper and anti-Wall sentiment isn’t going to help the cause. And while I agree with the protests in principle, the execution was lacklustre. A protest lacking substance lends itself to not being taken seriously.

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Image: Sask. Party