It has been ten years now since our family moved to Georgia, and every day we feel grateful to wake up in this great state.
As a parent, though, I am especially thankful for the Georgia HOPE Scholarship – an educational initiative enacted 20 years ago this month that uses Georgia’s lottery funds for college and pre-school funding. So far it has helped 1.5 million Georgia students pay for college.
Two of my own children benefited from HOPE, using the scholarship to pay tuition at the University of Georgia. Because of HOPE, our family story is very different from what we envisioned upon our arrival.
When we first moved to north Alpharetta (now Milton), our oldest daughter was a senior in high school researching eastern colleges. We’d worked hard and sacrificed over the years to finance the dreams of our kids.
We allowed our daughter to attend a private college in Boston, but were soon shocked to see her tuition rise dramatically between 2004 and 2008. Paying it consumed a large amount of what we had saved for all four of our children.
When our next two kids hit their junior and senior years of high school – 2008 and 2009 – the economy started to sour. The company for which my husband worked soon struggled. We realized that paying for college and still having enough to pay our bills, especially if my husband left his job, could result in financial peril. We began to look seriously at the benefits of the HOPE Scholarship at Georgia public colleges.
This was disheartening to my middle kids, who had worked to be near the top of their class and attended very selective schools. They soon accepted our financial reasoning and applied to UGA. They immersed themselves as students and fell in love with UGA and the Athens culture.
Meanwhile, my husband left his job and invested remaining savings in a small business that employs fellow Georgians. Our oldest daughter graduated and moved back to Georgia to work as an emergency nurse at Emory University. After UGA, our middle daughter headed to New York, but returned for a great job in Atlanta. Our son graduated this spring, and runs the business as he looks to further his education. Their younger sister strives for the HOPE as well.
I tell this story because The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has run a series of articles discussing the legacy of the HOPE Scholarship. Some believe that perhaps HOPE shouldn’t be for the high-achieving students who live in more affluent cities like Alpharetta and Milton. They argue that these kids can already afford any college.
Clearly for our family, the investment the state made in HOPE as a merit scholarship has fundamentally enhanced our lives, helping us to afford college and to re-invest in the state we now call home.
Veronica Buckman has been a resident of Milton for 10 years. You can reach her at vrbuck01@aol.com.
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