| UT Holds Public Forums On Tuition Hike
As the University of Texas considers raising tuition once again, education leaders from around the state are meeting to talk solutions for higher education. Those meetings are happening at the Frank Erwin Center to help increase college enrollment around the state significantly. The goal is to increase enrollment across the state by 30 percent from 2005 to 2010. While it is an achievable goal, still, university systems across the state feel they have to increase tuition to stay competitive, so while more students want to go to college, making it affordable is another challenge. Financial challenges, like getting students to apply through Free Application for Federal Student Aid, is just one of the many roadblocks to work through.
Contractor loses La. scholarship account data dating back to 1998
BATON ROUGE, La. -- A Boston-based contractor hired to store and safeguard state scholarship and college savings account data lost most of those records _ including bank account numbers and student and parent Social Security numbers _ during a move, officials say. "We certainly don't want to create any panic. But people should be aware and take the necessary steps," said Melanie Amrhein, executive director of the Louisiana Office of Student Financial Assistance. "This is backup data off of a mainframe that contains sensitive personal information." Special equipment and software and "sophisticated computer skills" would be needed to get the compressed records from the TOPS scholarship program, START Saving Program, and Free Application for Federal Student Aid, according to a notice posted on the Internet.
After Harvard, Yale boosts aid
Yale announced this week that it will change its undergraduate financial aid policy for all students this fall. The changes are meant to make college more affordable for middle and upper-income families and follow in the footsteps of a similar policy enacted by Harvard last December.
"We want all of our students to make the most of Yale academically and beyond without worrying about excessive work hours or debt," Yale president Richard Levin said in a press release. "Our new financial aid package makes this aspiration a reality."
At both Yale and Harvard, parents with annual incomes below $60,000 a year will not have to contribute toward their child's college education, and families with incomes from $60,000 to $120,000 will now pay between 1 and 10 percent of their incomes toward tuition.
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