For many students nationwide, the beginning of Autumn marks either a tense season of college applications or the beginning of a collegiate education. College tuition prices are a difficult subject in the eyes of concerned parents and their children, as the wrong decision could potentially cripple a family for years.
This is no different in the state of Ohio. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the average net price for a four-year college in Ohio is $19,138.93.
In an attempt to provide collegiate education to intelligent high school students who may not be able to afford traditional schooling, The Ohio State University founded the Eminence Fellows Program within its University Honors Program. Now in its third operating year, the Eminence Fellows Scholarship provides a full cost of attendance coverage, paying for room and board in a residence hall for eight semesters, as well as a meal plan.
The Eminence Fellows program is open for all academically driven students to apply, but they first must be accepted into OSU’s Honors program. Upon reaching finalist status for the program, personal interviews are conducted. According to Program Coordinator Rebecca Ward, the application “look[s] at the student holistically.”
“It isn’t just the student who has perfect test scores, wants to go to medical school and is a slick interviewee,” said Ward. “We are looking for people who are intrinsically motivated.”
Outside of financial assistance, Eminence Fellows receive academic assistance. Freshman and sophomore seminars are provided, and students are given the opportunity to create a service project within their class. Students are advised by Ms. Ward herself and other faculty members and have access to an Eminence faculty network.
Programs like these are not readily available to all students nationwide. Yaniza Creamer, a Washington, D.C. student studying Public Relations at American University, attended AU via a Tuition Exchange (TE) program. Her father, a college professor at a TE member school, helped her qualify for AU’s Tuition Exchange scholarship, which provides $35,000. When Creamer’s father switched jobs, however, she felt unsupported by AU.
“College tuition is something constantly kept in the back of [students’] heads,” said Creamer. “AU doesn’t help with loans, and when my father switched jobs, I was kind of left in the dark.”
Creamer ended up taking a semester off of school for financial reasons, but will eagerly return this fall, quoting that she’d “loved the experience so far and the people [she’d] met” as well as the “the overall atmosphere” at AU.
The newly appointed Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, has yet to comment on college tuition prices, and her website provides no information on her stance. Given the focus on free college in 2016 Democratic Nomination Candidate Bernie Sanders’s campaign, tuition prices are likely to remain a hot-button issue.