Georgina Lambert

HB 1774 represents a highly partisan restructuring of New Hampshire’s education ecosystem, sponsored exclusively by Republican legislators and aligned with national efforts to defund humanities, education, and social service fields. While framed as fiscal accountability, the bill externalizes structural labor inequities onto students and institutions, placing vulnerable populations at disproportionate risk. From a humanities perspective, the bill reflects an instrumentalist philosophy that reduces education to wage yield, undermining democratic values, civic development, and ethical stewardship of public goods. Without substantial revision, HB 1774 is likely to exacerbate inequality, destabilize institutions, and weaken New Hampshire’s long-term social and economic resilience.