Learn more about the resources PNC offers to help you learn about financial aid.
Module Transcript
Welcome to PNC's financial aid education center. Before we get started, we'd like to take a moment to tell you a little what to expect.
Everyone knows that college is a great investment. In fact, according to the College Board, adults with a college degree earn, on average, hundreds of thousands of dollars more over their lifetimes than those with only a high school diploma.
Sure, we have heard about the gazillionaires who never went to college or who dropped out after inventing the latest and greatest software. But those stories are few and far between. A college degree helps to maximize your chances of being successful. A degree gives you choices you may not have had without an education. And it may open up new doors you never knew about.
Have you ever applied for a job? Doesn't the application always ask about the level of education you completed? Sure it does. And the reason is that employers value a college education. A college degree helps to provide a complete education and the ability to apply it to real-life situations.
Is going to college expensive? You bet it is. Is it worth it? Well, almost everyone agrees, "absolutely." Not just because on average you get your money back in future earnings, but in so many other ways that we'll discuss in this course. Today, the cost of simply obtaining a college degree is significantly higher than a generation ago. Private colleges and universities cost $50,000 or more per year. Public colleges, like your state college, may cost $20,000 or more. Even attending the local community college may cost $10,000 or more, and that's assuming you live at home. We'll go through the costs in more detail, but we can agree that college is expensive.
The important question is not how much college costs but how much you'll actually be paying out of your own pocket. Keep in mind that three-quarters of students attending college receive some financial aid. No, not all financial aid consists only of loans that must be repaid. Let me emphasize that. Billions of dollars, yes billions with a "B," are outright grants from the government. You don't pay it back. You don't work for it. And you don't have to be poor or be a super whiz or star quarterback to qualify for them. It's just free money available to you because our society believes so strongly in helping people go to college. All we ask is that you pass your courses. Eventually, you'll be a taxpayer too. And by having gone to college, you'll be contributing more than if you hadn't.
So three out of four students are not paying the whole cost of college by themselves. Nor are their families.* That's what we'll be talking about here. We'll talk about the costs. We'll talk about how much of that cost you and your family will be expected to pay. We'll talk about the different financial aid programs available to you and how you go about applying. And we'll dispel all those myths about loans and the financial aid process. After you go through this course you'll understand the financial aid process and you'll be in a better position to choose the college program you most want to attend without thinking only about money.
The first thing we'll cover is the cost of attendance, which includes expenses such as tuition, fees, room and board, books, plus all those extras we don't always think about. Then we'll get into some of the nitty-gritty details of financial aid.
Once you understand the choices available, we'll talk about the different programs that help you meet your financial need. Yes, many students take out loans to help pay those costs. Minimizing the amount of money you borrow and choosing the right loans based on a sound strategy are important topics that will be covered. But we'll also remind you that a college education is an investment. Borrowing money to help you pay for college might be a smart thing to do for some, but maybe not as smart for others. We'll help you to know the difference, and we'll talk about the long-term ramifications of borrowing.
Finally, we'll go through the process of applying for and being awarded financial aid, which will help you choose the right college with all the facts at your disposal.
The main thing to take away from this discussion is the notion that our society has placed a premium on providing education to everyone willing and able to go. That's the idea of "access," a major tenet of financial aid that no one should be denied the opportunity to attend college simply because he or she cannot afford to go. But there are other parts of the commitment, including "choice" and "persistence."
Choice means that not only should everyone be afforded the opportunity to attend college, but that they should have some choice about which school. Financial constraints shouldn't preclude a person from going to the college he or she most wants to attend for all the academic and cultural reasons, even if that college has a higher price tag than a school that is less costly. We'll demonstrate how choice plays into the decisions students make when we discuss financial need and financial aid.
The third piece of the financial aid puzzle is persistence in continuing on the path toward graduation. All this says is that if a student attends a particular college, has received aid, and has succeeded academically, the students should have confidence that he or she will continue to be able to get the financial aid needed to graduate.
So now, let's get started!
* U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, 2009.
Understanding "Need" >>
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