Between cuts to the HOPE scholarship and higher tuition and fees, Ben Williams will pay about $1,400 more out-of-pocket each semester at Georgia State University.
To pay the bills, the rising junior found three jobs on campus. They don’t pay as much as off-campus jobs, but at least his bosses understand studying comes first. He gets money from the federal Pell Grant program and he took out about $3,700 in loans.
Work and class will fill his weekdays, so he’s planning to study about 10 hours each day on Saturdays and Sundays.
"I'm doing what I have to do to afford my degree, but it means I won't have time to actually enjoy being in college," Williams said. "I'm barely making it and I just know it's going to get worse."
As fall semester begins, students and their families are grappling with a new financial reality. Students are paying hundreds of dollars more -- about a 9 percent increase -- in tuition and fees this year to attend one of the 35 colleges in the University System of Georgia. At the same time they're learning just how much -- or little -- the revamped HOPE scholarship provides.
HOPE used to pay all public college tuition and provide some money for books and fees if students maintained a 3.0 grade-point-average. Now only the state's most accomplished students, about 10 percent of recipients, get full tuition awards. The rest will see their scholarship amounts vary annually, depending on revenue from the Georgia Lottery. This year's award equals 90 percent of the 2010-11 academic year tuition rates and does not include extra money for tuition increases. No one gets money for books and fees.
Gov. Nathan Deal and other lawmakers knew the changes would create financial hardships for some families, but they said the new rules were the only way to protect the program for future recipients. They said the state couldn't afford to exempt current recipients from the changes. HOPE was on track to run out of money by 2013 because lottery revenue could not keep up with soaring enrollment and tuition.
With about one in three University System students receiving HOPE, college presidents didn't know how many would return for fall semester. Official enrollment usually comes in November.
Kennesaw State University has been one of the state's fast-growing colleges, but President Dan Papp said they're not expecting a big jump in enrollment this time.
Clayton State University President Tim Hynes said affordability is a key concern for his students. About 75 percent are the first in their families to go to college and almost half receive Pell, federal grants designated for low-income students.
"So many students are struggling to piece together scholarships and loans and grants and jobs that we don't know who will be able to be here," Hynes said. "We don't know how many will be able to afford to return spring semester."
University of Georgia President Michael Adams assumed economic woes would make it harder for the college to fill its freshman class and directed staff to admit several hundred more students than usual. Instead, UGA started classes this week with about 500 more students than anticipated and hired more lecturers, added course sections and converted dorm lounges into bedrooms to accommodate the extra students.
While the impact of HOPE was less than feared, Adams said financial aid requests are up.
"I hardly go anywhere anymore where I'm not asking somebody for help with financial aid," Adams said.
While some families can absorb the HOPE changes and tuition increases, federal studies show more than half of college students work more than 20 hours a week.
Haleigh Hoffman, a sophomore at Piedmont College, saw the HOPE award for private college students drop from $4,000 to $3,600. She's living at home and depending on a combination of loans, financial aid and a part-time job at the campus bookstore. She worries working will hurt her 4.0 GPA, but said she needs the money.
Last spring Hoffman cashed in a savings bond before it matured to buy books. This year she made lists and compared prices at online retailers and bookstores and looked if she could save money renting texts or buying used ones. She got five textbooks – including two lab sciences texts – for $208.
While she has strong marks in college, her high school grades weren't good enough to earn the full HOPE award. Only valedictorians, salutatorians or those who graduate high school with at least a 3.7 GPA and a 1200 SAT (math and verbal sections) or 26 ACT score get full tuition scholarships. They must maintain a 3.3 GPA in college.
"It's my fault that I didn't try harder in high school but if I knew they were going to change the rules I would have studied more," Hoffman said. "When you're 14 it's hard to understand that what you're doing can hurt you later on."
Sometimes confusion over the rules causes harm.
Parent Sonya Fields assumed her daughter, a student at Georgia Southern University, would receive HOPE. She graduated with a 3.0 GPA, but it dropped to 2.914 after the state agency that oversees the scholarship recalculated it. The agency eliminates some of the extra credit schools award students who take advanced classes.
Fields, who described herself as a low-income single parent, applied for a new 1 percent interest loan program the state funded as part of the HOPE overhaul. About 5,100 students applied for the Student Access Loan Program and the Georgia Student Finance Commission is still doling out the $20 million allotted by the state.
Fields said she was deemed ineligible for that loan and instead took out one with a 7 percent interest rate. Her daughter plans to be a special education teacher, which could put her on a path to have some loans forgiven. But because the loan is in mom's name and not the daughter's they may not have that option.
"Oh well, you do what you have to do," Fields said.
Williams, the Georgia State student, plans to graduate in 2013 and is taking summer classes to make that possible. The sociology major plans to attend law school, but he doesn't know if he can afford graduate school having already taken out loans for an undergraduate degree.
"The state didn't just cut our scholarship, they're putting limits on our plans and dreams," Williams said. "I want to be optimistic about my future but I fear it's looking bleak."
A different HOPE
College students continue to get the HOPE scholarship, but they're getting less money. Here are some of the changes. More information can be found at gacollege411.org.
-- Only high school valedictorians, salutatorians and those who graduate high school with at least a 3.7 GPA and a 1200 SAT (math and verbal sections only) or 26 ACT score will get full tuition awards. They must maintain a 3.3 in college.
-- Students with at least a 3.0 still get HOPE, but the amount will vary annually depending on lottery revenue.
-- Students no longer get money for books or fees.
-- The private college scholarship dropped from $4,000 to $3,600.
-- Students have one chance to reclaim HOPE if their grades drop. They used to have unlimited chances.
HOPE Amounts
HOPE will vary annually, depending on lottery revenue. The current award equals 90 percent of 2010-11 academic year tuition rates. Here are semester rates for a sample of metro Atlanta colleges:
College ... Tuition fall 2011 ... HOPE fall 2011
University of Georgia ... $3,641 ...$3,181.50
Georgia Tech ... $3,641 ... $3,181.50
Georgia State ... $3,641 ... $3,181.50
Southern Polytechnic ... $2,564 ... $2,240.10
Georgia Southern ... $2,367 ... $2,068.20
Kennesaw State ... $2,367 ... $2,068.20
U. of West Georgia ... $2,367 ... $2,068.20
Clayton State ... $2,201 ... $1,923.30
Georgia Gwinnett ... $1,648 ... $1,440
Georgia Perimeter ... $1,235 ... $1,079.10
Source: University System of Georgia, Georgia Student Finance Commission
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