Tag: student loans

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Setting the Example: How First-Gen Students Raise the Bar & Their Debt to Better Themselves

Setting the Example: How First-Gen Students
Raise the Bar, and their Debt, to Better Themselves


University of Arkansas first-generation students have decreased over the years, but the student loan debt has steadily increased and exceeded Arkansas’ average over the past 5 years, according to the College Scoreboard, a Department of Education database.

By Elena Ramirez
The Razorback Reporter

When individuals gain higher education, they accomplish the most effective way to raise their families’ income, according to research from the National Center for Children in Poverty. Yet higher education is expensive and intimidating, especially for first-generation students, who often have little background in navigating through the unknown world of federal loans, private loans and applications. 

Emily Beltran is a Rogers New Technology High School senior and prospective UofA Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design student. Photo by Emily Beltran.

“It’s harder because in a way, you’re guiding yourself,” said Emily Beltran, a Rogers New Technology senior and a first-generation student who has been accepted to the University of Arkansas. “Your parents can’t give you much advice … it’s definitely hard not being mentored by your parents.”

The complexity of paying for college is just one of the many issues first-generation students need to resolve on their own. The average debt for first-generation students at the University of Arkansas has increased by 12.3% to $14,423 in 2018, over the past five years, according to College Scorecard, a Department of Education database. Dekarius Dawson, first-generation senior music major studying voice, said he has struggled with his out-of-state tuition rate. The native of Memphis, Tennessee has attended the UofA for three years and will be graduating in December with more than $29,000 of federal student loan debt, double the amount for first generation students at the U of A.

Despite that amount of debt, Dawson notices the important precedent of his work.

“To me and my family, this is a huge accomplishment, because I’m setting an example for my brothers and others in Memphis,” he said. “Receiving a degree is the new standard I’m trying to start.” 

Dekarius Dawson is a first-generation student at the UofA. He will graduate this fall with a vocal music degree that he completed in three years. Photo by Elena Ramirez.

Dawson became a part of the UofA’s First-Generation Mentoring Program. He was paired with professor Timothy Thompson, who was also a first-generation college student in 1971.

Thompson recalled he was able to receive his undergraduate degree without acquiring student loans. “I can’t imagine being an undergraduate student these days and coming into these five sometimes six-figure loans and not having any idea if you will have a job when you get out of school,” Thompson said.

The three-year-old program, funded by the Honors College, provides students a mentor on campus. Students have to be the first in their family to attend a four-year college.

Despite the 12.3% increase in debt for first-generation students, enrollment for trends are heading in the other direction:  first-generation enrollment has declined 3% over the past four years. The decrease of first-generation students is something that Chancellor Steinmetz is focused on with the new student success center that will open in the Spring 2021, said Ramon Balderas, student development specialist. “We grew very fast over the past 10 years. We are still trying to adjust to the changes,” said Balderas. “Our resources are very spread out and the new student center will help students.” About 26% of the UofA’s student population is first-generation.

Thompson has been a leader in the First-Generation Mentoring Program. Photo by Elena Ramirez.

The UA Student Support Services is a federally funded program that helps first-generation and low-income students. The program serves 325 students a year.

One local high school is working to support first generation students for life after campus. Two counselors at Rogers New Technology High School are pursuing initiatives on their campus to ensure students have a plan for after high school. Counselor Cindy Caudle said the Rogers New Technology High School principal wants “no graduate to be left on their parents couch in June.” Brenda Walkenbach, who has had 25 years of experience in high school counseling, wants to present high school students with multiple options. “It may not include college, it may be the workforce or the military,” she said.  Caudle added that a number of students enlisted in the National Guard or fully enlisted in a branch of the military as a means to pay for college.

Every second Tuesday of the month, students and their parents meet at Rogers New Technology High School for a “Senior Wrap Session” where they are provided with guidance about post-secondary school options and resources.

High school counselors Brenda Walkenbach (left) and Cindy Caudle (right) help students prepare with the next steps after high school. Photo by Elena Ramirez.

Beltran, a Rogers New Technology student recently accepted into the UofA’s Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design, said she will be the first in her family to attend a four-year college. She is a part of the Early College Experience program, where she attends Northwest Arkansas Community College while enrolled in high school. She will graduate from community college with an associate’s degree. 

Beltran has applied to approximately three scholarships so far and is relying on family support for the amount that cannot be covered, she said. She isn’t familiar with the loan process and has been intimidated by the essay portion of scholarships.

“Writing has always been my weakest subject, but I can go to NWACC’s (Northwest Arkansas Community College) writing center and I know they can help me there,” Beltran said.

Being first-generation motivates her to accomplish school and to better herself, she said. It will bring a change for her family. 

She knows that school comes at a high expense, but said getting her prerequisites out of the way “is like a stress taken off of [her] shoulders.” 

The cost of school, she said, will not hold her back.

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What Students Should Know About Loans

What Students Should Know About Loans

With tens of millions of students in debt and the debt total climbing, it is important to break down different types of loans and the problems they can cause.

Avery Nihill waited until her senior year to take out a student
loan. Photo by Parker Tillson

By Parker Tillson
The Razorback Reporter

Avery Nihill, a 21-year-old senior studying environmental soil and water sciences, was careful not to get caught in the trap of student debt.
 
“My parents kind of discouraged me from doing it,” Nihill said. “But this is my last semester and it’s a loan that I took out so that I could finish without any worries.” 

Some incoming college students blindly sign up for student loans without realizing what kind of loan they are receiving and the financial issues it can cause. Nihill, a San Antonio, Texas, native, was much more careful, and waited until her senior year to take out a $2,750 subsidized loan in order to pay for school. 

Students graduate from the UofA with an average of a little more than $22,000, but Nihill is projected to graduate with far less than that. 

There are several loans that students use to pay for college. Loans can differ by number of dollars, interest, whose name the loan is under and more. 

Subsidized and unsubsidized loans are the two most common types of direct loans, and the key difference between the two is the timing of interest accrual. Subsidized loans are granted based on financial need. Students must pay off the loan, but not the interest that it has accrued during their time in school. 

Unsubsidized loans require students to pay off the loan, including the interest amassed during college, and they are not granted due to financial need. Students are granted these loans more often than subsidized loans, according to the U.S. Department of Education.

Students are assigned a subsidized or unsubsidized loan based on their estimated family contribution, a measure of their family’s financial strength, which is calculated by the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA.

“Most students who are coming to college have enough means through their family to run that estimated family contribution up too high to get a subsidized loan,” said Denise Burford, associate director of Financial Aid and Scholarships at the UofA.

The Parent PLUS loan is the third type of direct loan, which is under the parent’s name and allows the family to take out a larger loan.

Denise Burford, associate director of Financial Aid and Scholarships, at the University of Arkansas. Photo by
Parker Tillson.

As of 2019, more than 42 million loan recipients have racked up almost $1.5 trillion of student loan debt in the U.S., according to the U.S. Department of Education. More than 34 million of borrowers and $1.2 trillion of the debt is from direct loans, money that comes from the U.S. Department of Education.

The giant debt can be attributed to several things, but one reason is a rise in tuition costs. 

Since 2008, in-state tuition has gone up more than 42%, and out-of-state tuition has risen more than 39%, according to data from 381 universities given to U.S. News and World Report.

“School just costs a lot more,” Burford said. 

Some students defray the increasing tuition by obtaining grants, money given to students directly from the federal government that students do not have to pay back. 

Nihill received a Pell Grant worth a little more than $4,000, which she qualified for because she comes from a family of seven and demonstrated financial need. 

“It helped a lot my freshman year,” Nihill said. “We didn’t know if I would be able to stay here because I’m from out-of-state and school is expensive, but because I got the Pell grant I was able to come back.” 

Pell Grants are given to students who have an estimated family contribution of less than $6,000, according to Burford. The amount you receive depends on your school, your status as a student, and how long you plan to stay. 

Students can also receive a Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant (FSEOG), which is worth less than a Pell grant. The UofA disburses more than $1 million more than any other Arkansas school in FSEOG grants. 

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Gender_Inequities

Women Face Higher Student Loan Debt, Workplace Challenges


By Kirsten Baird, Coleman Bonner, Abby Zimmardi 
The Razorback Reporter

The average female student loan debt in Arkansas is $10,051, which is about $1,250 more than the average male student debt in 2016-17, according to a College Scorecard study, a U.S. Department of Education database.

Juliet Sittler, a UofA junior majoring in accounting, has around $19,000 in student loans from her first three years of college, she said. She intends on taking out more loans for graduate school and hopes to pay them off in less than five years. 

Sittler, 20, from Tulsa, Oklahoma, said she’s entering a field dominated by men. “I would say that I’m not the only female, but there are way more guys than girls in all my classes,” Sittler said. Enrollment in the Walton College of Business in 2017 was 64% male and 35% female, according to the UofA Student Degree, Enrollment and Demographics.


On top of the gender disparity in student loans, some female students are entering professions with a significant gender imbalance, and they may not be paid as much as their male counterparts.

According to the U.S. Department of Labor, the top male-dominated fields are civil engineering, which is 14% female; chemical engineering, 18% female; and electrical engineering, 9% female. In each of these fields, women earn only about 89% of what men do, according to a study by the Department of Labor. 

Summer Smith, a junior biomedical engineering student, said she is aware of her place as a minority within her field, yet she feels it could be used as an advantage.
 
“I think it’s kind of cool because you get a lot of different opportunities that women that are in a female-dominated field don’t have,” Smith, 20, from St. Louis said. “Since people are looking for women engineers, I think it really makes me stand out.” According to the UA Office of the Registrar, the engineering student body is 76% male and 24% female.

UA senior Katharine Jovicich, 23, from Dallas, who is majoring in chemical engineering, said she has acquired over $100,000 in student loan debt. Jovicich will be paying off her loans with no help from her family, besides living at home rent free, she said. 

“My goal is three years, but I think I could pay the minimum payment and it goes maybe 10-20 years,” Jovicich said. “But I just want to be out of it and so I will live very simply and still at home and get all of that paid off.”

The gender imbalance in engineering is obvious even to the men. “In school, engineering is definitely male-dominated. I’d say at least 80% male, and in certain disciplines it was even more so,” said Jeremey Porterfield, 32, from Bryant, Arkansas. “You feel it in the culture of the company.”

Portfield graduated from the UofA with a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering and was awarded about $4,000 in scholarships during his time on the Fayetteville campus. He currently works as a project manager for Garver Engineers, but is still paying off his $40,000 in student loans.