By: Michael McIntee, UpTake Reporter

The reason college students are deeply in debt and graduate without a job is because some of them shouldn’t be in college says Representative Mark Buesgens (R-Savage). He made the comments during a House floor debate about a bill requiring teachers to pass a basic skills exam before being licensed in Minnesota.

He unsuccessfully offered an amendment that would require teacher candidates to pass the exam before entering a teacher training program in college.

He said the state is putting “ideas of grandeur” in students heads by not making them take a basic skills test before even entering a training program. He said too many people with college degrees are unemployed and have to pay back massive student loans.

Rep. Carlos Mariani (DFL-St. Paul) disagreed and compared teacher degree programs to another profession. “A good analogy here would be requiring aspiring doctors to pass their medical boards in order to get into medical school. Why would we do that?”

The bill passed the House unanimously and is on its way to the Senate.