DECATUR - Efforts are under way to derail a planned interest rate rise for student loans.

The interest rate for subsidized student loans will be 6.8 percent beginning in July, said U.S. Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., in a conference call held Thursday. Using the slogan "Reverse the Raid," Miller, U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and several organizations are supporting legislation that would drop that rate to 3.4 percent.

Organizations including Campaign for America's Future, the U.S. Student Association, Rock the Vote and Campus Progress at the Center for American Progress are gathering support at campuses and encouraging students and parents to contact their representatives and senators.

Durbin said he had been at the University of Illinois-Chicago on Thursday morning, and students were stunned to hear the impact the new interest rate will have on student loan costs.

"They can't understand how some of the most vulnerable people in America would be saddled with this additional debt burden," he said. "We're trying to make sure we undo it and quickly."

Durbin and Miller blamed President Bush and a Republican-controlled Congress for raiding education funding in order to allow tax cuts for the wealthy.

"(The Republicans) cut $12.5 billion out of the student aid account," Miller said. "They could have recycled that back into helping these families, but it went to fund tax cuts. They chose to give to the richest people in the country. We want to give to the students in the most need."

College costs are rapidly escalating out of the reach of the middle class, he said, and states aren't doing enough to fund public colleges and universities, forcing those institutions to raise tuition and pass costs on to students and their families.

Though Rep. Tim Johnson, R-Ill., agrees with Durbin and Miller on several points, he doesn't see higher education as a partisan issue. He voted in favor of Miller's amendment to the College Access and Opportunity Act, which would have cut student loan interest rates, but that amendment failed to pass. The Act passed a House vote on March 30. The College Access and Opportunity Act, among other provisions, raises the maximum Pell Grant from $200 to $6,000 and repeals the "tuition sensitivity" rule that limits aid for those attending low-cost schools.

"I'm deeply concerned about the state of higher education and what appears to be an attack on it at the state level in terms of appropriate funding, and at the federal and state levels in terms of student assistance," Johnson said. "I believe this is a critical time for higher education, and we need to do everything we can to maintain it as a priority."

Valerie Wells can be reached at vwells@herald-review.com or 421-7982.