The ability to go to college is a tremendous opportunity that many young students are trying to accomplish. Just being accepted is a difficult enough task for any young person to achieve, and when it comes to the top tier schools in the higher education realm, then you have even more difficult odds to beat. However, just because you are accepted doesn’t mean you are home free. Now you need to know how you can pay for it. Take these steps into consideration before you get a significant (and unexpected) bill from the college or university.
Pay Before You Start
Summer vacation after a student’s senior year of high school may seem like a right of passage, but at the same time goofing off for a full summer of only a few months probably isn’t worth the years of debt or the thousands of dollars of interest that the student will have when they graduate! Even a minimum wage job can net around $300 per week. And aside from the added motivation of getting a good education so that they don’t need to work minimum wage jobs their whole life, a summer of 12+ weeks could easily bring in almost $4,000 before overtime! It might not pay the full year, but it could put a significant dent in the annual bill.
Pursue Grants
Many grants are more need-based opportunities than anything else, but if you apply for as many grants as possible, then you should be able to secure at least a few. When you consider the fact that grants are free money and don’t need to be paid back, you can understand why it is imperative to try and capture as many as you can.
Seek Out Any Scholarships
Scholarships can be both private and school provided. The key with scholarships is simply to apply to as many as possible. Because scholarships are also free money, there are some students who have been able to bring in more money with scholarships than their education bill costs. For this reason, it only makes sense to seek out as many as possible and apply to the countless scholarships that exist.
Internship Opportunities
Not all internships pay, but they can be one of the first dominoes that continue to make sense in the long run. If you find a paying internship then you are killing two birds with one stone by bringing in money to pay for your education while also gaining experience. However, if you don’t get paid for an internship, you can still pick up the skills and pad your resume in order to get a higher paying role sooner rather than later. You can then start paying within a few semesters to keep the bills down and you can catapult yourself forward in order to have a higher career trajectory.
Crowdfunding Possibility?
While it is still a new field, the crowdfunding world is slowly taking over many landscapes and changing them for the better. This is the same scenario that some are finding when it comes to higher education and if you look into the right crowdfunding apps or devices then you can have others sponsor you as you prepare for your college career.
Military Service
While not everyone will agree with the military as the best option, the fact remains that they do pay up front for your college education. You do have to make sure that you sign on for service over the long haul in order to receive certain funding. You also want to be sure that you are prepared to be committed to the cause. That being said, if you are simply able and willing to spend a few years in the service then you can receive a college education that is mostly paid for as well as pick up a handful of experience and training that will only further serve you in the real world.
Live At Home
While every student wants to have the experience of living on a campus and being part of a crazy social life known as college, the fact of the matter is for the first few semesters a young college student can put him or herself in a much better position by living at home. You not only won’t have to pay as much money for the room and board portion of the education (which can be thousands a year), but you will also be able to stay comfortable and focus on school without distractions.
When it is all said and done, a college education is a tremendous opportunity for anyone to have. However, the strategy that you need to use to fund it is going to be one that will set you up for years of financial freedom or one that will act as a debt ball and chain for years.
