How'd I miss this?
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STANFORD, California (AP) -- Hoping to encourage students scared by rising higher education costs, Stanford University is eliminating tuition for undergraduates from some of the lowest-income families.
Under a new program announced Wednesday, students from families with annual incomes of less than $45,000 will not pay tuition. Those with incomes up to $60,000 will pay about $3,800, the school estimates.
Stanford's undergraduate tuition for the next school year will be nearly $33,000. Add in other expenses, such as books and housing, and the cost averages about $47,000.
"Students from low-income backgrounds are underrepresented at our nation's most selective institutions," said Richard Shaw, Stanford's dean of undergraduate admission and financial aid.
"Many families ... may be discouraged by the stated tuition, so we want to be more forceful with this new program in encouraging talented low-income students to consider Stanford," he said.
at CNN.com: click here for entire article.
6 comments:
I applaud their efforts but I'm still discouraged by the number of students from low income families who still won't qualify for admission, despite the tuition waiver.
This is a start but there's only a handful who can or will take advantage of that opportunity. Black families are not teaching their children the importance of higher education!! I'm sorry but in my house, college is NOT an option. It's mandatory!!! Most people from my home town frown upon it because they say youre "trying to be white." WTF??!!!???!!! If by chance they ever decide to leave home and do something with their lives, they choose to join the military *sigh*
Okay, so they're emulating Princeton, Yale and Harvard's moves. That's good. Positive moves in a positive direction. Hopefully more universities will do the same.
I don't know @ SM. I guess I'm a little more optimistic. I know people usually don't move on things, but hopefully some will as word gets around more. It could definitely change things. They're already showing progress, albeit not major, at a couple of those schools. Princeton: "As far as low-income students go, we went from 88 to 129, an increase of 48 percent."
http://www.princeton.edu/pr/pwb/03/0505/1b.shtml
And Penn made some changes to their financial aid package and within a year it "increased the percentage of low-income students accepting admissions offers from 61% to 72%"
http://www.dailypennsylvanian.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2006/01/10/43c370029534a
Not tooo shabby for new programs.
88 to 129 at Princeton. That's not too shabby at all. I like to see actual numbers because percentages alone can be deceiving as they vary with the sample size.
I look forward to seeing the numbers continue to grow as other Ivy Leagues implement similar programs (one step forward).
I just hope there will be an equal number of low income students to step up and take advantage of these opportunities. If not, I can just see the headlines now (two steps back).
I'm sorry but my cynicism is bred from years of observing complacent behavior. Perhaps I should be more optimistic as well.
At any rate, thanks for providing the reference links. I'll check them out.
This is our 40 acres?
KZ
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