Intro to Paying for College

Anyone considering going to college must face the question of how they will pay for it. While some may be fortunate enough to be entirely supported by their parents, the reality for most is a need to find funding through a mix of grants, loans, and scholarships. Essential to all this is correctly and timely filing out FAFSA, an unfamiliar and scary process.

Source: USA Today

We’ve all heard about the rapidly rising costs of attending college, and such warnings are true - the cost of tuition is much higher than ever before. In addition to tuition, those living away from home will need to cover room & board as well, which depending on the school and location may be no easy task in itself. But not all hope is lost. The good news is that accompanying those soaring tuition costs are increasingly available funds for students. For those looking, there are a variety of options to receive money to cover these costs. FAFSA will be one of the primary ways to find funding, so we’ll devote a whole section just to that. Outside of FAFSA and the grants it provides, scholarships are another option for “free” money offered to students. 

I’ll also go into more detail just on student loans - borrowing money that you’ll eventually have to pay back, plus interest. Despite what you may have heard, even student loans aren’t all bad. Though they should be treated with caution, student loans can be another empowering tool for access to higher education. Taken responsibly, they are another piece of the financial puzzle for paying your way through college. Altogether, grants and scholarships and loans form the main arsenal for those taking on tuition and living costs - so if you are planning or even slightly considering going to college, you’ll want to know about them as much as possible.