Should College Be Free for Low Income Families

01

Foreword

College affordability is a complicated and multi-faceted challenge. The cost students and families are asked to pay has steadily increased over the past several decades, despite the being of federal, country, and institutional grant programs, which are oft non sufficient to fill the gap in need. Just as troubling, most students and families aren't given clear and useful information about what they should await to pay or how to navigate the system.

This is a challenge I worked on as a policy adviser in the Obama administration, and I've connected to work on information technology during my time at Lumina Foundation. At Lumina, nosotros've suggested that the conversation around affordability exist reframed around a concept we've called the Affordability Benchmark. We need to make college affordable past focusing on the educatee first—not on what tuition is, not on what aid is available—but on the pupil experience. Affordability should be defined by what is reasonable to await students and their families to contribute toward their pedagogy, and this information should exist shared with them in clear and predictable ways.

We need action on the part of states, institutions, and policymakers at all levels to brand this a reality. The steps laid out here by the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation are articulate, cogent, and compelling action items that every institutional leader should take seriously. Well-resourced institutions, in particular, should motion forward quickly to implement these activeness items every bit evidence of their commitment to truly reshaping their practices in a way that benefit low-income students.

Ultimately, we need a better system of financing postsecondary education that frames affordability in a way that is articulate and predictable, built effectually a defined benefit, and based on a reasonable contribution of resource available to students and families. The burgeoning path to a improve reality for students has been fabricated articulate past this well-researched work—if institutions take these recommendations seriously, more students would likely enroll in college and exist financially successful while at that place.

Dr. Zakiya Smith
Strategy Manager, Lumina Foundation
Quondam Senior Adviser for Education in the Obama White Firm

02

Introduction

College can seem out of reach for many depression-income students. Also oftentimes they believe higher is unaffordable and unattainable. It is no surprise and so that students from the bottom socioeconomic quartile are 8 times less likely to earn a bachelor'southward degree than students from the summit socioeconomic quartile (vii.4% versus 60%).¹

Even our nation's brightest depression-income students, who have washed very well in high school and score highly on standardized tests, are less likely to obtain a college degree than their higher-income peers, a discrepancy known as the "excellence gap."²

Several factors hinder students' access and success. Low-income students may lack agreement of how financial aid works, or perceive they are unable to run across the total costs of higher didactics. Low-income students are more likely to suffer from "sticker daze" on seeing the ostensible toll of a college education, to attend colleges closer to home to salvage money, and to pursue choices that allow them to work while in school. While state and federal funding can help to offset college costs, low-income students frequently are unaware that institutional assist tin significantly lower costs and in some cases make college admittedly free. They do not understand the value of institutional aid, work/study policies, and loan forgiveness policies. They may not know how to utilise for institutional aid required at some institutions, such as the completion of the Higher Board's College Scholarship Service Profile and the Institutional Documentation Service (IDOC). Institutional aid could potentially play a much more important office in increasing admission and persistence among low-income students, if these gaps in cognition were removed. Colleges and universities have a function to play in educating low-income students about how to pay for college.

This cursory offers 11 best practices to institutions to aid students pay for college and stay in school. These strategies are organized into three categories: clarifying financial information, easing the financial brunt, and filling in financial aid gaps. Specifically, nosotros discuss how schools can provide students with meliorate information to help them brand more than informed choices, to brand going to college more than affordable, and to sympathise how financial aid programs work then that they tin maximize the aid they receive.

03

Clarifying Financial Information

The federal government has recognized that students take the right to data that can assist them brand the best decision regarding their education.³ Colleges thus brand a range of data available to students, such as the toll of attendance, graduation rates, and student body variety. However, this information is disseminated in various means that are not always the well-nigh convenient for the individual pupil. Some facts are distributed to all enrolled and prospective students or are available online to anybody, while others are available only upon asking, or sent out in publications and mailings. Sadly, the information provided is often a confusing mess, and low-income students — often sorting through the data without a seasoned advisor at their side — must navigate these puzzles on their own.

Data that is only available upon request or through selected mailings puts depression-income students at a disadvantage. Students may non be aware that the data even exist, much less that they should be seeking these figures. Lack of understandable information puts low-income students at a disadvantage, and they may incorrectly conclude that a college education is simply unattainable or may enter college without a full agreement of how to navigate the many fiscal aid programs, and ultimately drop out.

Schools should transparently provide all students with the relevant knowledge needed to make the best decisions virtually their education and paying for it. Schools can proactively support low-income students by providing clear, comprehensive information to all students, regardless of whether it is requested. This includes providing students with the near accurate figures available related to costs, financial help, and student success, as outlined in our get-go 5 strategies beneath.

Strategy 1: Clarify financial aid letters

Accompanying many offers of admission is a fiscal assist laurels letter. These letters often use acronyms and abbreviations, and they may lump together scholarships and loans in ways that are difficult for students and families to understand.⁴ Variation in financial aid letters from school to school can get in difficult for students and families to compare offers.⁵

To address these issues and help families make more informed decisions nearly higher, the U.S. Section of Education and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau developed the "Financial Aid Shopping Sheet" in 2012. This form was designed to simplify data regarding toll and financial aid and let students to easily compare institutions. Elements of this form include:

• Separation of loans from grants and scholarships.
• A concise statement that grants and scholarships are gifts that do not demand to be paid dorsum.
• The sources of grants and scholarships.
• The internet ("actual") cost of one year's tuition.
• Clear language (due east.g., no abbreviations or acronyms).

In an open alphabetic character to college and university presidents, the Department of Education asked institutions to adopt this course for the 2013–14 school year. Every bit of Jan 2017, 3,278 institutions — including 60 selective institutions — take obliged.⁶ A copy of the form and a list of participating schools can exist institute on the U.S. Department of Education website. More schools are using this course every year. Schools should at the very to the lowest degree apply it as a template to clarify the elements of their financial aid and then students can compare offers.

Institutional award letters should make clear:

• The corporeality of grant assistance the educatee is receiving, with clear language indicating that grants are gifts that exercise not need to be paid dorsum.
• The source of each grant.
• Possible additional sources of funding (e.g., private scholarships) to pay the internet cost (the difference betwixt cost of attendance and grant aid).
• Clarification that loan amounts are suggestions, not requirements.
• A articulate statement of how much money the student and family unit will need to pay, including an explicit statement that loans must be repaid.
• The net toll of attendance.

In add-on, schools should brand clear the terms of continuation of any aid:

• The requirements for maintaining each grade of grant funding, such as grade signal boilerplate requirements or minimum credit load requirements.
• A disclosure as to which grants must be renewed annually (including federal or country aid) with instructions on how to renew the help.

Strategy 2: Provide students with a four-year estimate of expected costs

Unexpected rises in tuition can derail students, particularly those who may already be struggling financially to stay in school. But informing potential students that tuition prices may increase is not sufficient. While schools cannot exist expected to know the exact tuition costs of future years, schools can project potential increases in tuition to help students brand informed decisions and prepare for the next four to six years. Giving students an idea of the price of education for the elapsing of their schooling can let students to budget and plan for potential tuition increases well in advance. Some schools accept begun offering this data on their fiscal assist websites. Other schools can adopt these best practices:

• Towson University projects four-year academy costs for autumn 2017 through 2020.
• Manhattan Schoolhouse of Music provides estimated projected cost of attendance for 2017–18 through 2021–22.
• Culver–Stockton College provides estimated annual costs for the 2018–19 and 2019–20 schoolhouse years.
• As of Fall 2017, several schools provide cost of attendance for the 2017–eighteen and 2018–19 academic years. For example, Sweet Briar College and Wesleyan College both provide data on two years of tuition and other costs.

Supplying future cost estimates is useful for students as they explore various colleges. An optimal solution would be a estimator that could approximate each individual student's potential internet cost (incorporating fiscal aid) over the class of college.

Strategy 3: Establish clear policies regarding financial assistance eligibility requirements

Figure 1: FAFSA Text Reminder from the Common App. Source: "Using Texts to 'Nudge' Students on Financial Assist," Educational activity Week, Oct eleven, 2016.

Virtually students who lose their eligibility for student financial assistance exercise so because they lack the necessary grades, and therefore are unable to meet the "satisfactory academic progress" requirements of their assistance program.⁷ Under the Student Correct-to-Know Act, schools must make the conditions of satisfactory bookish progress "available" to all do good recipients.⁸ However, schools can see the requirements of the statute in a number of ways. The virtually direct way would be by including these requirements in the aforementioned envelope with their financial aid award letters, simply not all schools cull this choice. Instead, schools frequently make this data available through publications or online.

Once students are enrolled, institutions should remind them periodically of requirements and deadlines. The Free Application for Federal Student Assistance (FAFSA) form is a requirement for the Pell Grant, the federal government's program for the most financially-strapped students, and for a number of other public and private scholarships. FAFSA completion is important for maintaining various forms of aid. Students are not always aware that FAFSA must be completed annually in society to continue receiving need-based aid. Schools should remind students of specific FAFSA deadlines. Enquiry suggests that low-price interventions, such every bit text reminders, amend students' completion of FAFSA and other higher related tasks.⁹ Many schools already communicate important information, such as emergencies, to students through e-mail, text, and automated letters (Figure 1). Transmitting reminders about financial assist deadlines would benefit many who would otherwise drib out.

?Schools Offering Financial Aid Text Notifications

• Wayne State University
• Vernon College
• Rio Hondo College

Strategy 4: Establish more robust methods for estimating not-tuition costs

Half of all undergraduates (50 percent) alive off campus, while the remainder live on campus or at home.¹⁰When providing fiscal aid, colleges are required to judge living costs for students who are living on their ain. However, estimating off campus housing costs can be challenging, resulting in dramatic variation of estimates of off-campus living costs amongst colleges, even between colleges in the same city. Researchers have institute, for example, that college estimates of living costs in Washington, DC ranged from $nine,387 to $20,342, while colleges in Milwaukee accept estimated costs ranging from $five,180 to $21,276.¹¹Furthermore, researchers have estimated that one-tertiary of colleges underestimate living expenses.¹²The interpretation of living costs has disquisitional implications for students who depend on fiscal aid. Underestimationof living expenses tin mean insufficient fiscal aid; overestimation tin can lead to students borrowing more than money than they need.

Many schools survey students to obtain data on living costs. These surveys do not accurately estimate costs, because they capture what students are spending as opposed to what they demand to spend.^xiiiNether-resourced students may underreport costs, because they are missing meals, sleeping in their cars, or burrow surfing.^fourteenA survey of undergraduates at the University of California, Berkeley found that 23 percent of students reported skipping meals at least somewhat often to save coin.¹⁵On the other hand, wealthier students may report higher living costs than necessary.^xvi

When estimating off-campus living expenses, schools should utilize standardized information or validate pupil-reported information with standardized data, such equally information from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, U.Due south. Section of Agronomics Food Plans, and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The significance of this information is too important to become incorrect.

Strategy v: Educate students about financial aid

Relatively few students have even minimal knowledge well-nigh financial assist. According to the 2015 Administrative Budget Survey, administered by the National Clan of Student Financial Aid Administrators (NASFAA), over 70 percent of administrators at four-year institutions reported that students' financial literacy was "limited."¹⁷Knowing the source and requirements of fiscal assist enables students to make better fiscal planning decisions.

Schools should encourage or crave students to meet with a financial aid adviser before signing off on financial aid packages to ensure students understand their packages and make informed financial decisions. 1 study of financial aid recipients constitute that when students sought financial help advising, they found it useful.¹⁸Alternatively, schools should likewise offering webinars or videos that walk students through an example of a financial help letter and discuss common questions or issues that students confront to assistance them ameliorate empathise their financial assist packages.

Some processes that ostensibly help facilitate approving of grants are problematic. For example, at that place are online systems that allow students to sign off on their financial aid packages without fully examining or understanding them. Further, a student'due south parent may independently agree to a financial aid package if a educatee has consented to permit their parents admission to their fiscal aid information. Parents should not be immune to consent to burdens imposed on their children.

Examples of Financial Assistance Educational Resources Offered by Schools

• Stony Beck University (SUNY)
  Financial help YouTube page covering a range of topics, including "Accept and Turn down Aid" and "SBU Satisfactory Academic Progress Guidelines."
• University of California at Berkeley
  YouTube page offers videos addressing diverse fiscal aid topics. Videos include a tutorial of UC Berkeley's financial aid system.
• University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
  Presentations for students and parents.

04

Easing the Financial Burden

As noted, rising college costs can make higher education seemingly unattainable for depression-income students. They are more than likely to forgo college education entirely due to perceived financial constraints.¹⁹ It is no surprise that depression-income families are more likely to find financial assistance critical in selecting a college, particularly in calorie-free of the loftier toll of a college education.²⁰These students' college choices may be limited to what they can afford rather than the best fit. For loftier performing, low-income students, this may mean sacrificing selectivity.

In one case enrolled in higher, low-income students are more likely to leave without obtaining a caste. Bereft funds to meet basic needs and the requirement to piece of work while in schoolhouse contribute to the increased rate of attrition.²¹

Schools tin can help to ease the burden of financial stress and support low-income students in multiple means, outlined in strategies six through ix below.

Strategy half-dozen: Prioritize need-based institutional grants

Over the last 20 years there has been a shift towards merit-based scholarships and abroad from need-based aid. In 1995, the majority of institutional award dollars were need-based.²² However, by 2003 the majority of institutional award dollars were merit-based.

Non-need-based assistance, such equally merit scholarships, is probable to concenter students who can afford to pay for higher. Information technology also attracts students who are at the peak of their class.²³ Accordingly, merit-based awards benefit institutions, merely they tin exacerbate the excellence gap by limiting assistance to students who may need information technology the virtually.

In other words, wealthier students may exist getting more aid than they need, while low-income students are unable to meet even their minimum financial requirements. A report by Postsecondary Education Opportunity suggests that students from lower-income families had greater unmet need than their higher income peers.²⁴ Another study found that more than a quarter of students from the acme income quartile, or students from families that can afford to pay for college, received merit grants.²⁵ Accordingly, institutional aid that is used for merit aid hurts low-income students while not materially helping wealthier students as they have little to no fiscal demand.

Institutional assistance is an important source of fiscal aid, particularly amidst students attending private institutions (meet Effigy 2). In 2011–12, 67% of the assistance received by students attending private four-year colleges came from institutional grants, and 25% of the aid received by students at public 4-year colleges came from institutional grants.²⁶

Closer exam of private colleges and universities shows varying practices in institutional assist. At the everyman-priced private institutions, low-income students actually receive less institutional assistance than students from higher-income families, because of the merit aid awarded to loftier-income students. Unsurprisingly, at the highest-priced institutions, depression-income
students, on boilerplate, receive almost double the institutional aid than students from the highest income quartile (see Figure 3).²⁷

Additionally, high-income students are significantly more than likely to obtain funding that exceeds their demand (encounter Table 1).²⁸ Students in the highest-income bracket attention individual 4-twelvemonth institutions received an average of $5,800 in aid exceeding their need. Well-nigh half (45 per centum) of students from the highest-income brackets that attended private institutions received grant assist across what their demand dictates.

Figure 2: Sources of Grant Aid for Full-Fourth dimension Undergraduates,by Blazon of Institution, 2011–12

Figure 3: Institutional Grant Aid by Tuition Level and Family unit Income at Private Nonprofit Four-Twelvemonth Institutions, 2011–12

Table 1: Percentages of Full-Time Full-Year Students Receiving Grants and Grant Help Exceeding Need, 2011-12

Strategy 7: Commit to maintaining grant levels for the duration of a student'south bookish plan

Students inbound college may assume that grant funds will be stable throughout their higher years. However, research indicates that institutional grant aid at individual universities decreases past an average of $1,000 betwixt freshman and senior year.²⁹ Just every bit unexpected tuition increases tin can derail students,³⁰ unexpected losses in grant funds can potentially interfere with a student's educational progress, particularly when loss of grants are coupled with increases in tuition and fees. Schools should seek to maintain grant funds throughout the course of a pupil'south academic program, provided the student maintains minimum academic standards.

–Examples of Schools Committed to Maintaining Institutional Grant Levels for Four Years*

• Vassar College
• Grinnell Higher

*Grants may exist contingent on yearly application and changes in need

–Examples of Schools Offer Need-Based Grants But

• Vassar Higher
• Stanford University
• Harvard Academy
• Northwestern University
• Franklin and Marshall College

Strategy viii: Do not reduce institutional aid when students receive private scholarships

Private scholarships can help students come across unmet need and reduce debt. Many students seek such scholarships to brand college more affordable and to avert taking loans. Still, displacement of institutional help undermines the purpose of private scholarships as the cyberspace cost is not decreased and college does not become more affordable. In a survey of their scholarship recipients, the Dell Scholars program constitute that lx per centum of scholarship recipients were adversely affected past award displacement.³¹ When schools engage in displacement, they limit the benefit of individual scholarships, particularly for low-income students. Scholarships should supplement institutional aid, rather than supervene upon information technology.

–Examples of Schools with a Policy of Reducing Loans and/or Work Study Before Institutional Grants

• Vassar Higher
• Grinnell College
• University of California at Berkeley

Strategy 9: Apply low-cost textbooks

The cost of bookish materials such equally textbooks may place a burden on students with unmet financial need. The average cost of textbooks has increased past 73 percent over the by decade, and an private textbook can toll over $200.³² With nearly all courses requiring a textbook,³³ these materials tin can add together upwardly quickly. Students may be forced to go without textbooks or buy textbooks and brand other sacrifices in return.

A study by the Lumina Foundation establish that well-nigh instructors practice consider the toll of textbooks when choosing course materials for their students.³⁴ Furthermore, faculty tend to be dissatisfied with the loftier cost of texts. I faculty member from the report is quoted as proverb, "At a time when nosotros are concerned about the cost of a academy education and student debt, a $246 text is obscene." Open-licensed educational materials or open textbooks tin can significantly reduce course material costs. However, the awareness of these alternative resources among kinesthesia tends to be low.³⁵

The U.South. Public Involvement Research Group (U.Southward. PIRG) argues that institutions are well equipped to address the result of textbook prices through their libraries and support staff. They suggest a number of ways that schools can encourage the use of openly licensed materials.³⁶ Their recommendations include:

1. Aggrandize open textbook use on campus. Currently but five percent of courses use an openly licensedrequired textbook.³⁷
2. Implement policies that demonstrate administrative back up of, only exercise not mandate, open textbooks as a possible choice for course materials.
3. Develop programs that provide training and coaching around the apply of open textbooks.
4. Offering faculty release fourth dimension or stipends to explore open materials and contain them into their courses.
5. Assign a chair or committee with the coordination of these efforts.

–Examples of Schools Providing Information About Open up Educational activity Resources

• Baruch College
• University of California at Berkeley
• University of Wisconsin-Madison
• University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

05

Filling in the Gap

Even with financial aid, some students still struggle to run across basic needs. Unexpected life events can present financial challenges that interfere with students' studies. Over the past several years, schools have started identifying new strategies for helping meet students' outstanding financial needs. These strategies include setting upwards emergency aid and integrating fiscal aid with public benefits.

Strategy x: Prepare emergency aid programs

Unexpected fiscal emergencies can interfere with students' education and may lead students to drib out.³⁸ Nutrient insecurity is also a growing trouble among higher students. Low-income students should non have to choose between purchasing textbooks and meeting their bones needs, such equally eating and having a place to slumber. In one of the largest studies examining campus nutrient insecurity, researchers found that 40 pct of students attending Academy of California campuses did non have consistent admission to nutritious food and one-fourth said they had to choose between buying food or paying for didactics and housing expenses.³⁹ This inquiry suggests that nutrient insecurity and housing insecurity are far more than pervasive than is mostly understood. Inadequate nutrition may interfere with students' ability to focus and threaten their academic progress. This may be particularly true for low-income students who are facing tight budgets. Emergency aid programs tin aid to salve this fiscal pressure level and keep students enrolled in college.

Private foundations have stepped into the gap. The Lumina Foundation funded ii pilot projects — Dreamkeepers Emergency Fiscal Assistance Programme and the Angel Fund Emergency Financial help Programme — to provide support to students at risk of leaving school due to a financial emergency. They studied whether the students receiving Lumina'south aid stayed enrolled as a event of this support.⁴⁰ Evaluations of these projects showed that both students and administrators felt the assist helped students stay in school. Farther, authoritative data showed that re-enrollment rates of assistance recipients were comparable to enrollment rates of the larger student body.

In their "mural analysis" of emergency aid programs, the Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education (NASPA), constitute that 74 pct of 706 institutions surveyed offered emergency aid programs, and that many had been implementing these programs for years.⁴¹ Nearly schools besides offered more than ane type of assist.

The principal types of emergency aid offered by institutions include:

• Campus vouchers (help students purchase books and nutrient from the establishment book shop or dining hall)
• Completion scholarships (covers outstanding balances for students eligible to graduate)
• Emergency loans (brusk term loans)
• Nutrient pantries
• Restricted grants (provided with criteria related to bookish standing)
• Unrestricted grants (provided without criteria related to bookish continuing)

Recommendations to guide emergency fund programs based on these studies include:

• Develop a articulate governance structure and simplify administration. NASPA's landscape analysis showed that many schools integrated processes where departments (e.m., financial help and student diplomacy) work together to administer assistance. However, this can create a barrier to serving more students as the processes can become cumbersome. Indeed, in their evaluation of emergency assistance programs, researchers at MDRC, an pedagogy and social policy inquiry organization, found that students sometimes felt the procedure of applying for aid was crushing.
• Advertise widely. NASPA found that schools often relied on word of mouth to advertise aid programs. Because funds are limited, schools are often hesitant to annunciate widely. All the same, evaluations of Lumina'southward Dreamkeepers and Angel Fund pilot programs constitute that demand for emergency aid was less than colleges' initial fears.⁴²
• Diversify funding. Lack of financial resource is the leading reason why schools are not able to serve more than students. University foundations, private donors, and operating budgets tend to exist the main sources of funding for institutions providing emergency assistance programs. One mode to expand these programs is to solicit funding from other sources such as alumni giving or through fundraising events.

Strategy eleven: Integrate fiscal assistance and social services

Public benefit programs (e.thousand., Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Plan [SNAP]; Women, Infants, and Children Program [WIC]; and the Earned Income Taxation Credit [EITC]) may provide an important source of fiscal back up for students facing sudden financial challenges. Even so, many students may not exist enlightened that they qualify for these benefits or know how to apply.⁴³ Several community colleges across the land have begun linking students to these benefits through organizations such as Unmarried Stop USA, the Benefit Banking concern, and Seedco'southward EarnBenefits.⁴⁴ For example, Single Stop USA is located at several community colleges and provides students with complimentary services such every bit screenings and applications for public benefits, tax services, fiscal counseling, and legal services, also as instance direction with referrals to resources at the institution and in the community. In their evaluation of Single Cease United states of america, the RAND Corporation constitute that Single Stop was associated with a cloth increase in higher persistence, and that users of Single Stop attempted schedules with more credits than not-users. Taxation aid services were establish to be particularly beneficial.

Initiatives such equally the Benefits Access for College Completion (BACC) and the Working Students Success Network integrate access to emergency funds into traditional college processes.⁴⁵ For instance, schools targeted specific students, such as those with no expected family contribution, and flagged educatee records to inform them to contact benefits staff, as they may exist eligible for public benefits. Schools likewise housed public benefit services in campus departments such equally financial aid. An evaluation of the BACC initiative found an increase in student retention and found that it helped students overcome unmet financial need.⁴⁶

While at that place are restrictions on higher students receiving public benefits,⁴⁷ some exemptions apply that may allow some college students to qualify for benefits. For instance, many low-income college students may qualify for i of the SNAP exemptions — one of the few public benefits available to individuals regardless of family condition or inability.⁴⁸ Schools should consider partnering with organizations or providing staff with the tools to link students with public services that can assistance them meet their basic needs. Taking it a step further, Academy of Wisconsin–Madison has been working with the U.S. Department of Agriculture to go a SNAP retailer, which would brand information technology the first college in the land to take food stamps at cafeterias.⁴⁹ If successful, other institutions should consider this path.

–Unmarried Stop USA Schoolhouse Locations

• Miami Dade College-Kendall
• Delgado Community College
• Billy Rouge Community Higher
• Community College of Philadelphia
• Borough of Manhattan Customs College

06

Decision

Low-income students face numerous barriers when it comes to the pursuit of higher education. They are oftentimes disadvantaged by a lack of support in navigating the complicated fiscal data needed to make the best educational and financial decision for their future. In one case enrolled in higher these students too oft struggle to meet their basic needs, which undermines their academic performance and potentially threatens whatever grants or scholarships. Further, because of the lack of adequate funding, or the loss thereof, depression-income students are left with enormous debt whether or non they graduate. Many school practices exacerbate rather than alleviate these barriers. Schools have a responsibility to students and must recognize that not all students have access to the same resources. Practices that reflect the disparate realities of low-income students ensure that all students take an equal opportunity to succeed.

This report identifies the all-time practices that schools should implement to support depression-income students. Specifically, we recommend that schools:

1. Clarify financial aid letters by distinguishing loans from grants and scholarships, noting that loans must be paid dorsum, and clearly stating net costs.
2. Provide students with a four-year gauge of expected costs.
3. Establish clear policies regarding financial aid eligibility requirements, and include them in all financial aid accolade letters and communications.
4. Establish more robust methods for estimating not-tuition costs to provide students with more authentic information.
5. Educate students almost financial aid by requiring or encouraging fiscal assistance advising.
6. Prioritize need-based institutional grants.
7. Commit to maintaining grant levels for the elapsing of a student'southward academic program.
8. Practice not reduce institutional help when students receive private scholarships.
9. Apply depression-cost textbooks.
10. Set upwardly emergency aid programs.
11. Integrate financial assistance and social services.

Helping low-income students pay for college and increasing students' fiscal literacy takes more than only a financial aid cheque. It requires a commitment on the part of university administration and kinesthesia members to consider both big and small financial obstacles continuing in students' path and to seek out ways to remove those obstacles. Adopting the eleven strategies outlined in this brief can aid ensure more than low-income students not merely enroll in a college appropriate for their interests and abilities, but that they too persist through graduation without overburdening themselves with permanent debt.

07

Endnotes

¹ Keith Witham et al, America'south Unmet Promise: The Imperative for Disinterestedness in Higher Education. (Washington, DC: Clan of American Colleges and Universities, 2015).

² Christina Theokas and Marni Bromberg, Falling out of the Lead: Following High-Achievers through Loftier School and Beyond (Washington, DC: The Education Trust, 2014).

³ Various components of the Higher Education Act of 1965, equally well equally the 1990 Student Right-To-Know Act, reinforce this belief past requiring institutions to make public information on cost and outcomes (including graduation rates). The federal government likewise created the College Scorecard to inform students.

⁴ "First Test For College Hopefuls? Decoding Financial Assist Letters," NPR.org, accessed December 8, 2016, http://www.npr.org/2014/04/03/298330444/first-test-for-college-hopefuls-decoding-financial-aid-letters.

⁵ Ibid.

⁶ "Financial Assist Shopping Sheet," U.Southward. Section of Education, accessed November 16, 2016, http://www2.ed.gov/policy/highered/guid/aid-offering/index.html.

⁷ "Students Lose Financial Assistance for Failure to Make Satisfactory Academic Progress," Fastweb, accessed Dec 16, 2016, http://www.fastweb.com/financial-aid/manufactures/students-lose-fiscal-assistance-for-failure-to-brand-satisfactory-academic-progress.

⁸ "Information Required to Be Disclosed Nether the Higher Education Act of 1965: Suggestions for Dissemination" (Washington, DC: National Postsecondary Didactics Cooperative, November 2009), https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2010/2010831rev.pdf.

⁹ John Balz, "A Conversation about Texting and Behavioral Science with Ben Castleman," Apr xviii, 2016, https://medium.com/@jpbalz/aconversation-about-texting-and-behavioral-science-with-ben-castleman-568f48690c9f#.prambl8b8.

¹⁰  Robert Kelchen, Braden J. Hosch, and Sara Goldrick-Rab, "The Costs of College Attendance: Trends, Variation, and Accuracy in Institutional Living Cost Allowances," Wisconsin Hope Lab (paper presentation, annual meeting of the Association of Public Policy and Management, October 2014) http://wihopelab.com/publications/Wisconsin%20The%20Cost%20of%20College%20Attendance.pdf.

¹¹ Ibid.

¹² Ibid.

¹³ Sara Goldrick-Rab and Nancy Kendall, "The Real Price of College," The Century Foundation, March 3, 2016, https://tcf.org/content/report/the-existent-price-of-college/.

¹⁴ Rebecca Nathanson, "Tens of Thousands of Higher Students Have Nowhere to Sleep," Rolling Stone, Dec 22, 2015, http://world wide web.rollingstone.com/politics/news/tens-of-thousands-of-higher-studentshave-nowhere-to-sleep-20151222.

¹⁵ Katherine Seligman, "Hidden Hunger: Some Students Are Scrimping, Skipping Meals to Beget a Cal Degree," California Magazine (Cal Alumni Association), Nov 12, 2013, http://alumni.berkeley.edu/california-magazine/just-in/2016-03-08/hidden-hunger-some-studentsare-scrimping-skipping-meals.

¹⁶ Jill Barshay, "Underestimating the Truthful Price of College," The Hechinger Study, June 1, 2015, http://hechingerreport.org/underestimating-the-true-toll-of-college/.

¹⁷ National Association of Student Financial Assistance Administrators, "2015 Administrative Brunt Survey", April, 2015, http://www.nasfaa.org/uploads/documents/ektron/f5fdae89-a23f-4572-9724-15e5a9f614d2/0d73bf4cd48a43a6a9414b6ec1a6ab9d2.pdf.

¹⁸ Sara Goldrick-Rab, Paying the Price: College Costs, Financial Aid, and the Expose of the American Dream (Chicago ; London: University of Chicago Press, 2016).

¹⁹ Robert Bozick and Stefanie DeLuca, "Not Making the Transition to Higher: School, Work, and Opportunities in the Lives of American Youth," Social Science Research xl, no. 4 (July 2011): 1249–62

²⁰ "A Criterion for Making College Affordable," accessed December 1, 2016, https://www.luminafoundation.org/files/resources/affordabilitybenchmark-1.pdf.

²¹ Mark Kantrowitz, "Why Do Students Drop out of College?," Fastweb, Dec 17, 2009, http://www.fastweb.com/financial-aid/articles/whydo-students-driblet-out-of-higher.

²² Donald E. Heller, "Merit Assist and College Access," in Symposium on the Consequences of Merit-Based Student Aid (March, 2006), http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.544.2863&rep=rep1&type=pdf.

²³ Christopher Drew, "A Ascension in Students Receiving Merit Awards," The New York Times, July 17, 2012, http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/22/educational activity/edlife/a-ascension-in-students-receiving-merit-awards.html.

²⁴ Kim Clark, "Who Really Gets the Most College Financial Aid?," U.Southward. News & Earth Written report, October 19, 2009, http://www.usnews.com/education/blogs/college-cash-101/2009/ten/nineteen/who-really-gets-the-almost-college-financial-aid.

²⁵ Heller, "Merit Aid and College Admission."

²⁶ "Sources of Grant Aid for Full-Time Undergraduates by Sector, 2011–12 – Trends in Higher Educational activity – The College Lath," accessed Jan 24, 2017, https://trends.collegeboard.org/content/sources-grant-help-full-time-undergraduates-sector-2011-12.

²⁷ "Institutional Grant Assistance by Tuition Level and Family Income at Private Nonprofit Four-Year Institutions, 2011–12 – Trends in Higher Teaching – The College Board," accessed January 24, 2017, https://trends.collegeboard.org/pupil-assistance/figures-tables/institutional-grant-assist-tuition-level-family unit-income-individual-nonprofit-four-year-2011-12.

²⁸ "Boilerplate Grant Aid at Four-Twelvemonth Institutions: Need-Based, Non-Need-Based Meeting Need, and Exceeding Demand, 2011–12 – Trends in Higher Instruction – The College Board," accessed January 24, 2017, https://trends.collegeboard.org/student-help/figures-tables/average-grant-aid-4-year-institutions-need-based-non-need-based-coming together-need-exceeding.

²⁹ Rochelle Sharpe, "Why Upperclassmen Lose Fiscal Assistance," The New York Times, April 6, 2016, http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/10/education/edlife/why-upperclassmen-pay-more-they-may-go-less.html.

³⁰ Ibid.

³¹ Michele Waxman Johnson, "Private Scholarships Should Benefit the Educatee, Not the Institution," The Baltimore Sun, July 15, 2015, http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/oped/bs-ed-scholarship-displacement-20150715-story.html.

³² U.Southward. PIRG, "Student Grouping Releases New Written report on Textbook Prices," February three, 2016, [Printing release] http://www.uspirg.org/news/usp/student-group-releases-new-report-textbook-prices.

³³ "Opening the Textbook: Open Educational Resources," accessed December 5, 2016, https://www.luminafoundation.org/files/resources/opening-the-textbook.pdf.

³⁴ "Opening the Textbook."

³⁵ Ibid.

³⁶ Ethan Senack, Robert Donoghue, The Student PIRGs, "Covering the Cost", Feb 2016, http://www.uspirg.org/sites/pirg/files/reports/National%xx-%20COVERING%20THE%20COST.pdf.

³⁷ "Opening the Textbook."

³⁸ Christian Geckeler, "Helping Community Higher Students Cope with Financial Emergencies," MDRC, July 2008, http://www.mdrc.org/publication/helping-community-college-students-cope-financial-emergencies.

³⁹ Suzanna M. Martinez, Katie Maynard, and Lorrene D. Ritchie, "Student Food Admission and Security Study," July 11, 2016. http://regents.universityofcalifornia.edu/regmeet/july16/e1attach.pdf.

⁴⁰ Ibid.

⁴¹ Kevin Kruger, Amelia Parnell, Alexis Wesaw, "Landscape Analysis of Emergency Assist Programs," NASPA, accessed December 12, 2016, https://world wide web.naspa.org/images/uploads/main/Emergency_Aid_Report.pdf.

⁴² "Helping Community College Students Cope with Financial Emergencies"

⁴³ "Benefits Access for College Completion," Clasp, September 10, 2012, http://www.squeeze.org/issues/postsecondary/pages/benefits-access-for-college-completion.

⁴⁴ Ibid.

⁴⁵ Ibid.

⁴⁶ Ibid.

⁴⁷ For case, students are prohibited from receiving SNAP benefits unless they meet one of the exemptions, such as having children, working at to the lowest degree twenty hours per calendar week, or receiving Federal Work-Study.

⁴⁸ Elizabeth Lower-Basch and Helly Lee, "College Student Eligibility," SNAP Policy Brief (Heart for Police and Social Policy, June 2014), http://www.clasp.org/resource-and-publications/publication-i/SNAP_College-Educatee-Eligibility.pdf.

⁴⁹ Nico Savidge, "University of Wisconsin Moves to Allow Students Utilize Nutrient Stamps in Dining Halls," La Crosse Tribune, March 7, 2017, http://lacrossetribune.com/news/land-and-regional/academy-of-wisconsin-moves-to-let-students-use-food-stamps/article_2d15754c-27d1-56af-90c1-c4be05fc91b7.html.

loartheight.blogspot.com

Source: https://www.jkcf.org/research/making-college-affordable-providing-low-income-students-with-the-knowledge-and-resources-needed-to-pay-for-college/

Share this post