Photo: The Evergreen State College’s Financial Aid Office by Shayna Clayton
By Daniel Mootz
Every year, millions of students across the U.S. choose to study at colleges and universities in hopes of earning a degree and landing a meaningful job. According to the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), nearly 20 million people will enroll this fall at either a public or private institution. Over half will attend school full-time, and an average of 70.5 percent of all students will be forced to take out some kind of loan to cover their tuition. Sarah Goldy-Brown, an author and freelance writer for Student Debt Relief, reported on Oct. 3 that the price for undergraduate admissions rose by nearly 3 percent over the last decade, while “master’s degree costs increased by a total of 45% for public universities and 16% for private colleges.” Furthermore, it is projected that this trend will likely continue.
Recently, much attention has been given to the mounting student debt crisis, most notably in the form of a loan forgiveness program intended to alleviate some of the burden imposed on tens of thousands of public sector workers. In September, the Government Accountability Office released findings that the Department of Education (DOE) had “rejected 99 percent of applicants” for its expanded Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program. Based on new research by the College Board, well over half of all student loans are doled out by the federal government, yet an alarming 673 million dollars in potential aid remains frozen in “new layers of bureaucratic confusion,” according to Jason Silverstein of CBS News.
Three months ago, in July, the American Federation of Teachers sued the DOE and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos for denying loan forgiveness applicants on “arbitrary and capricious grounds.” Randi Weingarden, the president of the union, said on twitter that “instead of working with lawmakers to improve the program that millions of teachers, firefighters, nurses and first responders deserve, DeVos has vandalized it.”
The fact that higher education is too expensive for more than 14 million people to afford, or that it takes up to 21 years to pay off student debt and all of its accumulated interest, or that, “as of 2017, nearly 3.2 million people age 60+ are still paying off debt—three times more than were a decade ago,” means that the effectiveness of the American system of credit-for-accreditation is not only broken, but insidious and harmful to the social fabric. This data, compiled by Sarah Goldy-Brown on Student Debt Relief’s website, speaks for itself. The decision to apply for student loans is fraught with consequences which undermine the very benefits they are supposed to ensure. With the total amount of student debt reaching unprecedented levels, it is necessary to move beyond the scope of borrowing, and embrace a positive-sum restructuring of scholarship funds and grants.
In 2002, the NCES determined there were approximately 750,000 scholarships available to qualified students based on merit. However, these grants provide only partial coverage of tuition expenses. In fact, Mark Kranowitz, author of the 2011 book Secrets to Winning a Scholarship, revealed that the odds of being awarded a full-ride to school is a minuscule 0.3 percent. Likewise, the chance for qualified students to receive the average scholarship amount of $2,800 per year is only one out of 10. Kranowitz also points out that the main recipients of both federal grants and private scholarships are middle-income students, while lower-income students are more than 3 percent less likely to receive merit-based aid.
Even with a relative abundance of scholarship opportunities to explore, the reality is that many of these provide only slight relief for students struggling to pay for their education. More importantly, the competitive and individual nature of scholarship payouts pits students against each other, dismantling the potential for improving collective knowledge and realizing academic progress.
Eric Pedersen, Chief Enrollment Officer at Evergreen, said the school strives to be flexible and work with students when distributing academic aid. “The state limits our budget at 10 percent,” he told the CPJ, so most scholarships are funded through donations or through interest accrued by previous winners. Tuition waivers, or Scholastic Achievement Awards, are typically “about $5,000,” he added. College Advance, along with financial aid, offers unique scholarships “in mycology and social justice,” said Pedersen, while “cultural diversity, athletics, and veterans foundations” comprise just a few of the numerous pathways to becoming a Greener.
Often, the gift of scholarship can be as limiting as it is enabling. There is typically a set of criteria, or rules, imposed on the award. This means that recipients may be held not only to the behavioral and academic standards of their school, but also to those of the foundation that supports them. This dual caveat of control can affect the academic, social, and personal dimensions of a student’s experience.
The threat of having the gift of learning revoked is enough to dissuade anyone from branching too far out, or from behaving too authentically. It is ironic that such a stipulation be placed on success—it is a knowledge tax, and it makes it harder for both student and foundation to grow and develop. What is the point of the gift—what good is the giver—if there are regulations tacked on to the grant? Who is to say what sort of intelligence, what kind of work, or even what activities are acceptable once a level of exceptionalism has been shown? Scholarship groups, or even unions, might confront this model of managerial oversight by pooling resources and renegotiating contracts so as to actually get the most out of their funds. Such an endeavor would likely find broad support among school communities because the value of scholarships is widely recognized and thought of with prestige. A far cry from charity, the cornerstone of scholarship is self-sufficiency, and by all measures that is what higher education should invest in, establish, and inspire.
Ultimately, scholarship is a source of collegiate equity, and student loans are a source of school debt. I believe that the political conscience of America must rediscover the meaning behind all students’ worth, and promote the creative value of a truly novel education. By redirecting the culture of financial aid to become one of intentional scholarships and grants, and by reorganizing the economic reality of “need” to become one grounded in person-environment “achievement,” education will end up paying for itself through a dedicated student body and an alumni of trailblazers, supporters, and thinkers.
