Gov. Scott Walker yet again stole headline space by calling for an additional two-year tuition freeze for the University of Wisconsin System Friday.

Last April, state Republicans, upon hearing of the UW System’s $648 million positive balance, demanded a tuition freeze, despite the fact that $441 million of these funds were already slated for spending on initiatives and the rest was intended for use as a “rainy day fund.” This year, recent projections have shown that the system will have a surplus of more than $1 billion, prompting Walker to yet again stand in support of another freeze. This stance has dual purposes; not only will this additional freeze “make college more affordable for working families and students across our state,” but it’ll also be a major talking point for Walker as he runs for re-election in November.

Within the UW System, there are four different tuition rates: one for UW-Madison, one for UW-Milwaukee, one for the rest of the UW four-year colleges and one for UW two-year colleges. Prior to the freeze implemented last year for 2013-2015, tuition for all UW System schools had increased 5.5 percent every year since 2007, a necessary raise especially in more recent years to compensate for decreased state funding.

Although the UW System was and is running a surplus, it should not condemn it fiscally or hurt its credibility. If any other business or corporation was running a budget surplus of this size, the owners would be applauded and commended for good, practical business actions, rather than punished for their perceived mismanagement of funds. The surplus balance exists to ensure that departments and programs can be funded, since universities could no longer rely so much on state funds. As state funding decreased, the UW System had to rely more on tuition revenues to gather necessary revenue (also, the tuition rate kept adjusting to inflation).

Last April, like this April, Republicans and Walker acted out of anger and confusion about UW System reserves in the push for tuition freezes. These rash decisions, while producing results that are helping current and future students, really just fail to address the real problem regarding higher education funding.

Regardless of what happens with the potential 2015-2017 tuition freeze, more long-term solutions to college affordability must be implemented, including increasing state aid and refinancing student loans (through passage of the “Higher Ed, Lower Debt” bill), per Democratic candidate for governor Mary Burke’s suggestions.

While freezes, whether they be two-year or four-year, are definitely positive in the short-term, legislators must recognize their own shortsightedness in pushing for these types of changes versus allocating resources to find long-term solutions with lasting effects. Elected representatives must face the reality that, Wisconsin residents that graduate with a bachelor’s degree are saddled with $22,400 in student loan debt on average. In accordance with current interest rates on federal loans and a standard 10-year repayment schedule, graduates will pay $225 a month until they become student loan debt-free, a problem that will not dissipate due to a mere freezing of tuition.

Additionally, although Walker seems to be using this angle to now champion higher education affordability, it’s important to remember that budget cuts in the past have targeted public universities. For example, the biennial budget that passed in June 2011 included $250 million in cuts over two years to the UW System; later that year, Walker announced cuts of $46.1 million for the UW System over six months, totaling to nearly $300 million in aid reductions. Furthermore, even though the UW System only represented 7 percent of state spending, it had to absorb 38 percent of Wisconsin’s budget cuts.

Overall, although another round of freezing tuition may seem like a good idea, it is only a temporary solution, a mere band-aid on a gaping wound. In order to even begin to attempt to start the healing and reformation process, Walker and legislators must be willing to find more everlasting, permanent solutions to higher education affordability.