Tuition has been raised 4.3% for the 2013/14 school year. In September of 2012, Emerson College revoked a $20,000 scholarship that I was banking on in order to afford school. I’m graduating a year early in order to save my parents a year’s worth of tuition. And I’m frustrated.
I know my story is unoriginal. I know everyone is struggling to pay for school and if I look on the bright side, at least my parents are helping me out and I don’t have to pay for it myself.
But, I firmly believe that no one should have to be frustrated like this. No one should have stories about not being able to pay for college. Higher education and degrees are necessary to make it in today’s professional world, there is no denying that. But it is becoming increasingly hard to find a way to pay for these degrees, which is particularly frustrating because it’s essentially finding a way to pay for for a shot at a job.
Other colleges have a policy that mandates that the price that a student pays when entering as a freshman is the price the student pays for the duration of their education at the school. I think this is evens the playing field. Students know what they’re getting into at the beginning of their freshman year and they don’t have to worry about this evil 4.3% hanging over their heads for the rest of their undergraduate careers.
When I was looking at schools two years ago, I looked at the price I was given in my initial financial aid package and mapped out the four years of government loans, scholarships, and payment plans to make sure that my family could afford it. But now the whole map has been thrown out the window because of these two tuition bumps. Everything I planned for and everything I expected is different now, and there’s nothing I can do about it.
I’ve had people tell me to go to the Financial Aid office and ask them to help me find a way to make college affordable. But it’s not that simple. The proposed Financial Aid office solution brings up a completely different argument involving Emerson’s specific office. I have personally found them completely unhelpful and though I’m not sure, I think most students at higher education institutions feel the same way. Money is complicated and payment plans make no sense. I feel as though my parents and I, who have never done anything like this before, have been left alone to flounder in a sea of arbitrary numbers and depleting bank accounts.
I’m realistic. I know that the system is not going to change to make the price of tuition the same for the duration of my time at this school. But at the very least I would like some clear, helpful advice about how I can afford to become qualified to work in the professional world. I want someone to explain to me very slowly and clearly what qualifications are for the scholarship that I suddenly became unqualified for in September. I want someone to give me a specific number that I will pay each month through TuitionPay to avoid almost losing housing because I don’t know how to understand the eBill section of eCommon. These do not seem like unreasonable requests. And yet, I have not received any of this.
I’m sure I’m not the only one with frustrations about the financial aid and tuition issues regarding college, so why can’t we have a healthy dialogue about this? Why is discussing money so complicated and incomprehensible? I am willing to pay for this education, I made that decision two years ago, so why can’t I seem to get anyone to help me give away my money? I can only hope that this is a generational problem and the next batch of Emersonians, like the class of 2023 perhaps, will be blissfully unaware of the trials and tribulations we are going through now.
Megan Tripp is a junior WLP major who drinks way too much coffee and watches and re-watches Gilmore Girls way too often. She likes shiny things and looks forward to making a career out of making things up and writing them down.