Paying for a college education: begin early and consider every option.

• Author: Bohi, Heidi
• Position: EDUCATION

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If you think education is expensive, try ignorance--so the adage goes. Despite the increasing cost of college tuition nationwide, the decreasing availability of private funding sources and financial aid, and news of jobs paying lower wages and companies cutting back on hiring, university administrators still maintain there is no reason not to pursue advanced degrees and students should do whatever they can to fund their college education. Trying economic circumstances mean that it's simply a matter of coming up with more creative solutions for meeting funding challenges as the traditional college savings accounts resulting from parents scrimping and saving become more obsolete.

"Everyone has to take a serious look at the expenses associated with school and analyze what they can do to fund higher education," says Ted Malone, director of student financial assistance for the University of Alaska Anchorage (UAA) of the unstable funding trends.

FEWER LOANS

A survey conducted in March by the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities found that there has been a significant drop in the availability of private loans and 8 percent of its members had cut back or altogether frozen institutional student aid available through schools across the country. At the same time, these same schools are getting creative about how they can make their programs more affordable, including announcing lower-than-average tuition increases, tuition-hike freezes and introducing new programs that replace loans with grants. At UAA, Malone says, the funding crunch does not seem to be hurting enrollment. Applications for the fall semester are up 22 percent since last year and the offices of financial assistance continue to work with students to coach them through the process so that they consider every option and fully understand financial-aid opportunities and the application process.

"Mom and dad loans" and personal savings are becoming much less common, Malone says, partly because the amount of money needed for tuition is so much more expensive today. Private four-year universities average $25,000 per year, up 5.9 percent from last year and public four-year institutions are about $7,000 per year, up 6.4 percent. This is compounded by the fact that in many cases parents are using college savings for other expenses to offset the world economic crisis and the effects on the Alaska economy.

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CHANGING NEEDS

The ways students are funding higher education are all over the board, Malone says. Increasingly they are...