Stanford Increases Financial Aid for Low-Income Students

Following in the footsteps of Harvard, Princeton, and several other of the nation’s highest-ranking colleges and universities, Stanford has beefed up its financial aid program for low-income students. Students from families whose incomes are $45,000 or below will have the complete cost of their education covered by scholarship grants. During the current academic year, students from families with incomes below $45,000 were asked to pay an average of $2,650 toward their education. This forced many students in this income bracket to work while they were enrolled in college or to assume debt.

Stanford University’s new financial aid program will also be more generous to students whose family income falls in the $45,000 to $60,000 range. The average family contribution for families in this income bracket will be cut in half.

The new financial aid package will go into effect this September for the 2006-07 academic year. All new and continuing undergraduate students will be eligible for the new aid program. Stanford expects the new program will add about $3 million to its $66 million financial aid budget.

Stanford University has an endowment of $12.2 billion. At a conservative rate of return of 10 percent, Stanford earns enough income from its endowment in one day to pay for the increase in its financial aid program.

Copyright © 2006. The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education. All rights reserved.