Antonio Adessi

While reading the Bangor Daily News on Saturday, I came upon a headline that read “Maine remains worst state for business, Forbes says.” I was intrigued and read on.

The article talked of our fair state’s aging population and slow economic forecast being the leading causes for its grim condition. All the signs of a state that treats its workers fairly were there: we have unions and corporate taxation and regulations.

Unions, increased corporate taxes and regulations are for our benefit. If we didn’t have them, we wouldn’t have the quality of life we have. We and everyone else in the nation deserve the right to all these things. According to the article, Maine ranks 24th in the nation. Nobody has ever said, “Yeah, sure, exploit me as a worker and consumer. And oh yeah, dump our factories’ excrement in our rivers so we can drink them.” If we want to improve our economy and not expand it, which is a misconception, we need to think of new and innovative ways of becoming a successful state.

First, let’s discuss what the definition of success in terms of a state actually is. Success is when our young people graduate from the University of Maine and are able to find a job that both rewards them and benefits the community. It’s the state and the university doing everything in their power to keep these graduates in Maine and not Boston. It’s incentives like lowering tuitions and assisting in paying off loans so that we can be prosperous. We are going to school to be prosperous people! I don’t know about you, but I sacrificed five years of my life to go back to school and I want to be a benefit to my community.

Success is also taking care of the people who helped us get where we are. The baby boomers are growing old. They are also overwhelmingly huge in numbers and consequently need able bodies to take care of them. The trick to this is to invest in nursing programs at our universities instead of allowing them to become smaller. Expanding the field of nursing by increasing the number and accessibility of classes is key. Regulating the amount of money they should pay for tuition and insurance is also a big problem.

We should be steering new nursing students into the classroom with a cattle prod and getting them out into the workforce. Here’s an incentive for nursing students who complete their degrees and go out into the field: You complete school and sign a contract to work a certain number of years as a nurse and, in return, the school or state will write off your tuition.

The main problem I had with the BDN’s article was Forbes’ consideration of itself as the Webster’s Dictionary of a state’s success. Maine has great potential to be successful without giant CEO’s and a Starbucks on every corner. We have to improve our education systems and create places where kids can explore more opportunities to become successful after high school or college.

More vocational and trade schools, where kids can learn to be carpenters or gain basic nursing skills, should be attached to high schools. Students could benefit from an alternative schooling practice. It would give them motivation to be something, especially if they have difficulty learning in a classroom environment, as many children do. So what if we cannot regulate alternative education? Children can learn the basic skills they need and then should be guided by capable teachers into using the skills they posses.

Communities around Maine need places like the University of Maine to step up and take action. We need to keep as many people in the state as possible to make it strong and prosperous. Who cares if we are the lowest on Forbes’ definition of success? We are the highest in potential to be self-sustaining and healthy. We can build communities here in Maine that can be on the forefront of a new economical revolution that could sweep the nation like athlete’s foot at summer camp. I believe in you Maine.