Tuition costs outstrip scholarships
By Bill Donovan
Special to the Navajo Times
WINDOW ROCK, June 30, 2011
The deadline to apply for Navajo tribal scholarships expired Monday and scholarship officials are now wading through some 17,000 applications to see how many qualify for tribal funds.
"We have about $6 million available for the fall semester, mostly from the federal government," said Carolyn Calvin, public information officer for the Office of Navajo Nation Scholarships and Financial Aid.
It wasn't until a month ago that the department knew how much money would be available because of budget debates in Washington, but the federal scholarship program has remained relatively unaffected so far.
For the Navajo Nation, the status quo means there will be enough money to fund about half the applicants who qualify for help. Among that group, the grants will be handed out on a first-come, first-served basis.
In order to spread the money to as many students as possible, the tribe has placed limits on how much each recipient can get - $3,500 for Chief Manuelito Scholars, $2,000 for applicants who meet the financial need requirement, and $500 for those whose parents' income exceeds the need requirement.
As to how far that will go, it varies by school. The Pew Research Center, which surveys the approximately 2,000 U.S. universities, reports there is a wide range in tuition and fees.
A good portion of those schools, mostly state and regional schools, cost between $3,000 and $9,000 a year just for tuition. Food, lodging and books add another several thousand dollars.
Private colleges and universities are more costly, charging between $21,000 and $42,000 for annual tuition. A half-dozen schools, most of them in the Northeast, charge over $42,000 for tuition, according to Pew studies.
These figures indicate that even at the maximum allocations allowed, tribal scholarship funds only go so far in paying for college costs and Calvin said the program strongly recommends to Navajo students that they take advantage of other scholarships and financial aid that are available to them.
"We hope that they don't have to rely heavily on student loans because that gives them high debts when they graduate," Calvin said.
She pointed out that there are a lot of other scholarships available to Navajo and Native students. Tribal chapters award scholarships to their members and tribal enterprises, such as the Navajo Engineering and Construction Authority, also have their own programs.
Organizations that work with the tribal government, such as Arizona Public Service Co., also provide scholarships to Natives and many colleges and universities have their own programs as well.
ONNSFA officials recommend that students contact the financial aid office in the schools they are interested in, or already enrolled in, to check what is available.
All of the $6 million in Navajo Nation grants will be going to undergraduates. There is only $90,000 for the fall semester for graduate students.
That amount is expected to increase after Oct. 1 when the new tribal budget takes effect, Calvin said, but right now no one knows how much money will be allocated to scholarships.
The tribe has made a big push in recent years for students to apply for the Chief Manuelito Scholarship, which require a 3.0 grade average, good college test scores, and some study of Navajo language and history.
Although Chief Manuelito Scholars get more aid, studies have indicated that these students stand a greater chance of graduating and therefore the money has a bigger effect.
This touches on a debate that has been going on within the scholarship program for decades - whether it is a wise use of tribal scholarship funds to help students who only go to college for a semester or two before dropping out.
One proposal that was considered but never put into effect was to base the scholarship awards not only on need but also on how far the student has gotten in their college education. Under that proposal, those who make it to their junior or senior year in college would get bigger grants than those in their first two years.
ONNSFA will start notifying applicants of the department's decision within the next few weeks, hopefully before their fall classes start, Calvin said.