{"id":2243,"date":"2009-09-03T13:00:47","date_gmt":"2009-09-03T18:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/?p=2243"},"modified":"2017-06-20T10:30:31","modified_gmt":"2017-06-20T15:30:31","slug":"paying-for-college-is-no-small-task","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/tartan-news\/2009\/09\/03\/paying-for-college-is-no-small-task\/","title":{"rendered":"Paying for college is no small task"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

\"Freshman<\/p>\n

Freshman Brandon Napier stands at the end of a long line of students waiting to speak with a financial aid counselor in Building 10.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Sinclair Community College student Brandon Napier hopes financial aid will cut down tuition costs. Sinclair student Laquita Phillips needs her financial aid to pay for both tuition and living expenses.<\/p>\n

Neither student was aware that the state-funded Ohio College Opportunity Grant is no longer available to community college students.<\/p>\n

History<\/strong><\/p>\n

The grant was created to help phase out the Ohio Institutional Grant over a period of four years, according to Sandy Meadows, Assistant Director of Financial Aid at Sinclair.\u00a0 <\/span>At the end of four years, students still using the OIG would find it replaced by the OCOG.<\/p>\n

However, the new grant program required more money than originally anticipated.\u00a0 <\/span>The state voted to make the grant available only to students attending four-year colleges as part of the 2010-11 state budget.\u00a0 <\/span>Meadows estimates that Sinclair students lost a total of $5 million in combined OIG and OCOG funds.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>\u201cI think the state was working out what was best for students in Ohio,\u201d said Meadows.<\/p>\n

Financial aid at Sinclair<\/strong><\/p>\n

Although the OCOG is no longer available to Sinclair students, there are other financial aid options, according to Meadows. Students are not always aware of scholarship opportunities, she said.<\/p>\n

Meadows believes that many students are told about scholarships, but they do not always know where to find them or how to apply.\u00a0 <\/span>She recommends that students visit Sinclair\u2019s Financial Aid Web site for information about grants, scholarships and loans.\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

One type of financial aid available to Sinclair students is Foundation Scholarships.\u00a0 <\/span>These scholarships can be awarded according to field of study, academic achievement, creativity, leadership or community service, according to the Financial Aid Web site.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of times department scholarships will fall under that program,\u201d said Meadows.<\/p>\n

What to expect<\/strong><\/p>\n

There are a few things that Meadows believes students should know to make their application process easier.\u00a0 <\/span>Students need to apply for financial aid early and respond to letters and emails quickly.\u00a0 <\/span>Also, the longer a student waits to apply for financial aid, the longer the overall process will take, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re definitely quicker than we\u2019ve ever been, but there\u2019s still a lag time between the time you apply and the end of the process,\u201d Meadows said.<\/p>\n

The average application takes two to three weeks to process, according to Meadows.<\/p>\n

Changes may affect students<\/strong><\/p>\n

Napier, who is entering his freshman year, doesn\u2019t know how much financial aid he will receive, but he isn\u2019t worried if he doesn\u2019t get enough to pay for school.\u00a0 <\/span>A recent recruit to the Sinclair Pride baseball team, he believes he will have enough money for school regardless.<\/p>\n

Phillips has a different outlook.\u00a0 <\/span>If she doesn\u2019t get enough financial aid to pay for tuition, she won\u2019t be able to take classes this year.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sinclair Community College student Brandon Napier hopes financial aid will cut down tuition costs. Sinclair student Laquita Phillips needs her financial aid to pay for both tuition and living expenses. Neither student was aware that the state-funded Ohio College Opportunity Grant is no longer available to community college students.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3],"tags":[577,94,578,576,1976,14],"class_list":["post-2243","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-tartan-news","tag-aid","tag-college","tag-finances","tag-financial","tag-meagan-ewton","tag-sinclair"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"cc_featured_image_caption":{"caption_text":false,"source_text":false,"source_url":false},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5s3vR-Ab","jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2243","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2243"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2243\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15432,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2243\/revisions\/15432"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}