Checklist for the college-bound
August 11th, 2011by Jane S. Shropshire
Lexington, KY – Do you know any teenagers battling summer doldrums? If you can motivate them to focus on a bright future, hopefully those doldrums will vanish. School opens in a matter of weeks; students who can envision success and invest time in preparation now will be way ahead of their peers on opening day. Here’s a checklist of the top five things college-bound high school students can do to pave the way.
Read more at BizLex.com >>Tagged: Applications, Choices, College, Summer
Raise your IQ with private-college visits
June 27th, 2011by Jane S. Shropshire
Lexington, KY – The 20 members of AIKCU (pronounced “IQ”), the Association of Independent Kentucky Colleges and Universities, will open their doors wide to students and parents once again with Kentucky Private College Week, to be held July 18-22 this year. AIKCU member colleges are nonprofit and non-tax-supported; all are regionally accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools and offer four-year baccalaureate degrees. During Kentucky Private College Week, AIKCU members will make it especially easy to explore what they have to offer.
Read more at Bizlex.com >>Tagged: Campus visits, College
The business of higher education
May 26th, 2011by Jane S. Shropshire
Lexington, KY – Ads for proprietary colleges like University of Phoenix, National College, Strayer University and others surround us on billboards and websites, in newspapers and magazines. The advertising is successful: In Kentucky alone, proprietary institutions enroll roughly 19,000. Some of these institutions do a fine job of educating those who enroll, and they follow appropriate guidelines where recruitment and financing are concerned. Unfortunately, some do just the opposite: They pressure students to enroll and take on massive debt, and some students find that their course credits can’t be transferred.
Read more at Bizlex.com >>Tagged: College, Debt, Online degree program
Put aside rose-colored glasses and remember: loans must be repaid!
May 9th, 2011Jane Shropshire | Founder – Shropshire Educational Consulting LLC
Congratulations – if you’re reviewing financial aid awards you’ve been admitted to college and hopefully one that excites you. But now it’s time to look through clear lenses at what the awards actually tell you. Look at each college’s billed costs including all fees, then subtract the total amount of grants, scholarships and federal work-study offered. The net figure remaining is what you and your parents will have to cover through family contributions and loans. A word of advice: be conservative in taking out loans, despite colleges offering PLUS (parent) loans by the cartload. Make sure that you and your family will be able to pay off debt incurred without mortgaging your collective future. And if you’ve received more generous offers from other colleges, it can’t hurt to ask a financial aid office politely whether your award can be reviewed and adjusted.
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Read more at Unigo.com >>Tagged: College, Debt, Financial aid, Scholarship
