DES MOINES Iowa
Iowa’s college students are relying more on student loans and less on grants to cover tuition, according to a new report by the Iowa College Student Aid Commission.
In the 2005-06 school year, loans to Iowa students represented 53 percent of all aid, compared with 40 percent of aid in 1990, the report stated.
Meanwhile, work-study aid comprised about 20 percent of assistance in 1990, compared with about 9 percent in 2005-06. Scholarship money has remained about the same in the last 15 years, equaling less than 40 percent of student aid.
“Debt seems to be a major part of our culture,” said Keith Greiner, research director with the commission.
“We’ve gone on a percentage basis from being a country that emphasizes scholarships and grants, to a country that emphasizes debt as a way of financing education for individuals and really our entire system.”
In 2005-06, 209,000 students attended Iowa’s 54 colleges and universities and were awarded $1.83 billion in student aid, according to the report. Students who graduated with debt that year left with about $24,990 to pay back, according to the commission.
