State Legislatures' College Scholarships Updates

In New Mexico, the House passed a bill which would allow students to take a year off before atending college and still be eligible to apply for the Legislative Lottery Scholarship. Curerntly students need to begin college in September of the year they graduate high school. The legislation would allow up to 16 months for students to begin college. The legislation (HB 62) is currently with the Senate Education Committee.

The Wyoming House passed a bill (HB 13) that would allow students to qualify for each of the four levels of scholarship in the Wyoming Hathaway Scholarship Program without taking any foreign language courses. However, the Senate has amended the bill for the top two levels of scholarship to require at least two years of a foreign language to qualify. The Senate passed an amendment which would also allow for exceptions and waivers for certain small school districts which may not have the funding to offer all the necessary courses.

In Indiana, under Senate Bill 0577, children of military veterans with less than 100% disability would no longer be guaranteed a 100% waiver of college education costs. Children of 100% disabled vets would still qualify for the 100% reduction, but those with 80% or less disability as determined by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, would receive 20% plus the amount of the disability. So, if a veteran has a 50% disability, his child would be eligible for 20 + 50 = 70% reduction.


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More States Tightening the College Scholarship Belt

Indiana's Twenty-first Century Scholars Program has been helping low and moderate income Indiana students make it through college for more than 20 years now. Students in the 6th through 8th grades who meet the financial need requirement, need to sign up and promise to keep up at least a 2.0 GPA, not use illegal drugs or alcohol, or commit a crime and apply to an eligible Indiana school when it's time for college and they will receive tuition for up to four years of college.

But now the Indiana legislature is thinking about tightening up the standards to save money in an attempt to keep the program going. Over the past several years, the cost has exploded as more students took advantage of the program. This past year they needed to take more than $15 million dollars from other accounts to help pay for the program. Likely changes are moving the GPA requirement from 20.0 to 2.5 and also requiring that the financial need still exists when it's time for college.

Technorati Tags: College Scholarships Financial AidPaying for College Twenty-first Century Scholars Program Indiana Scholarship