It seems like every year the cost of college gets higher for students and their families. In June, the Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education approved a tuition increase for 25 of 26 state colleges. As the cost of receiving a college education continues to increase, students and their families need to be more aware of the various types of programs available to assist in covering the costs. From scholarships and grants to long-term savings programs and student loans, there are a number of options available to students. The key is to determine the right path for each individual and to know what options are available.

Savings Plans

There are only so many scholarships available each year for students entering college, so many times the best way to insure that there will be money to pay for tuition is with a good, old-fashioned savings account. The most popular savings plan is the Oklahoma 529 college savings plan, in which you are able to contribute a tax-deductible amount of up to $10,000 per year individually ($20,000 if married filing jointly) to the account. This money can be withdrawn tax-free when the student enrolls in college. However, if the student decides not to go to college, the money in this account may be subject to taxes, depending on its intended use.  

“The 529 really is the most prominent plan anymore,” says Todd Hoffman, senior vice president and client advisor at Bank of Oklahoma. “You want to try and find ways to minimize the tax amount on a savings plan.”

Aside from the Oklahoma 529, Hoffman says UGMA/UTMA custodial accounts are popular as well. With one of these accounts, money is placed into an account in a minor’s name but is controlled by a custodian or trustee until the minor reaches a certain age. These types of plans carry no restrictions, and therefore when the minor reaches adulthood, he or she may use the money for any purpose.  

“Many people still like using regular savings accounts,” Hoffman says. “That way they have complete control over how the money is used.”  

Another way to save money that is growing in popularity is Upromise, a program that allows consumers to earn a percentage back on purchases made through partner retailers. The percentage earned can be applied to a 529 account or invested in a high-yield savings account.

“Even if you are starting a savings plan when your child has only one or two years left,” Hoffman says, “You can contribute some, and every bit helps.”

For many families opening a savings account may not be an option, but there are still numerous avenues to be explored when looking into ways to pay for college.  

Do Your Research

In order to maximize potential when it comes to earning scholarships or grants, experts agree that it is best to take initiative and explore options.  

“There are numerous pools of government money floating around,” says Susan Tolbart, director of recruitment and student activities at Oklahoma State University-Tulsa, “but they aren’t bottomless pools. I always urge students to start looking at the different opportunities that are out there early.

“(Students) should look at it almost like a part-time job,” says Tolbart. “They can look online at websites like Fastweb and Peterson’s and see what different types of scholarships are available.”  

Students should also feel comfortable forming relationships with administration at the colleges they are considering.  

“It’s not unusual for incoming freshmen to work with academic support centers on campus,” says Kayla Acevo, vice president of public relations at the University of Tulsa, “to try and find just what forms of aid they are eligible for.”

According to Acevo, knowing which questions to ask is a frequent stumbling block for high school students.

“You see it a lot,” Acevo says, “especially when a student is the first, or one of the first, in their family to go to college. I would just say don’t be daunted if the answers to your first questions aren’t what you had hoped to hear.

“This is where your relationship with your high school counselor comes into play,” Acevo continues. “You can find out what steps need to be taken.”

The first step is to submit the FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid) as early as possible. This will determine a student’s eligibility for various programs like federal Pell Grants and student loans. 

Keep Your Grades Up

Not to be forgotten in the discussion is the importance of maintaining your grade point average. The competition is fierce when it comes to scholarships and grants, and students with the highest GPAs and standardized test scores usually attract the most attention.  

Maintaining a high GPA increases the likelihood of receiving a scholarship, widens the scope of possible institutions the student can attend and it may decrease the need for a student loan.

“We have the highest admission standards in the state,” says Dr. John Feaver, president of the University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma, “but only 35 percent of our students graduate with debt.”

According to Feaver, students at USAO are encouraged to look at all non-debt options first, and to work with academic counselors to assure that the program they follow is efficient and without superfluous classes.

“The thing that drives costs up,” Feaver says, “is a lack of good counseling, direction and student advisement.”

Student Loans Don’t Have To Be The Enemy  

Still, for many students, college would be impossible without student loans.  

“Sometimes,” Tolbart says, “(a student loan) will be the only way for a student to pay for school.”  

Like many schools, OSU-Tulsa offers graduating students exit counseling to make the transition from student to the professional world easier. It also serves to inform students about their responsibilities concerning repaying those student loans. A program that is growing in popularity is the Income Based Repayment (IBR) program. IBR allows enrollees to cap their monthly student loan repayments based on their income and family size.

“A lot of people choose an institution based on expectations of what college will cost,” says Acevo. “I strongly recommend to not discount any institution based on cost. Submit the FAFSA, look into the different grants and scholarships available and most importantly make sure the college you want to go to is a good match. There are always ways to pay for your education. You just have to be willing to do the work.”

Once upon a not-so-long-time ago, college seemed a simple question of getting there. But in an age of austerity and a challenging economic environment, getting there and making it count has made one of the biggest decisions in a young person’s life that much bigger.

Matt Eaton of Northeastern State University’s Office of High School and College Relations says choosing a college and major hinges on many factors.

“The biggest questions we get are cost-related questions,” says Eaton.

While costs play a major role in choosing a college, Eaton also emphasizes that considering the total experience is key in the selection process. It is vital, he says, to get a physical feel for a candidate college.

“Go take campus tours. I feel that is where you’re going to get a feel for the school,” he says.

Choosing the institution is the easy part. Choosing the major, however, is where the wheels hit the road. While modern economic realities have put a premium on choosing a major that will provide long-term financial benefits, Stephen Crynes, University of Oklahoma’s University College Assessment director, suggests selecting a major based on economics alone can prove a poor approach.

“It’s dangerous picking strictly on a job market,” says Crynes.

Crynes says a little self-analysis can go a long way in choosing a major. He urges students to consider their natural skill sets, goals and interests in declaring a major, even if their head tells a tale that their heart may not want to hear.

“Not everybody can be engineers even if they want to,” he adds.

Earl Johnson, associate vice president for Enrollment and Student Services at the University of Tulsa, says choosing a major comes down to one basic question; “What is it that you are interested in studying?” Test scores, he says, tend to point to a fulfilling field of study.

“Students tend to demonstrate a strength area,” Johnson says.

While some fresh high school grads know exactly what they want their lives’ work to be the minute they show up on campus, many don’t. For those seeking direction, most colleges and universities do not require an immediate major declaration and provide resources to assist students in that life-defining decision.

“You’re talking about what your major is going to be that is going to stick with you for the rest of your life,” Eaton says. “I think one of the biggest things you can do is make sure that is what you want to do.”

Crynes explains that time as an undeclared major gives a student an opportunity to explore diverse fields to which they may have not been exposed before arriving on campus.

University of Tulsa students have until the second semester of their sophomore year to decide on a major. At Northeastern State, students normally declare a major after 15 hours of coursework, while the average University of Oklahoma student has declared a major after completing 24 academic hours.

Ultimately, however, college is about more than solving a campus and major equation.

“It’s part science and part art,” says Eaton.

In 2008 the nation was in the midst of what would become the longest economic downturn since the Great Depression, with rampant unemployment. At the same time, wind energy was very exciting. The entire industry was ramping up, promising to be a very apt employer. Our wind-rich state had no training programs to create workers for this new industry.

Oklahoma City Community College saw this gap and worked with local wind energy experts to create the state’s first wind turbine technical program, providing both the opportunity for Oklahomans to be marketable job candidates and also a desirable workforce for the industry.

Oklahoma now ranks among the top 10 states for wind energy production, and projections put Oklahoma on the fast track to second in the nation.

OCCC’s wind turbine technical program is just one of many examples of continuing and adult education programs around the state that work to fill gaps in workforce skills.

Corporate Learning at OCCC works with industry and the workforce to create training for the ever-evolving job market. Programs like eMarketing Essentials, Green Energy, Oil and Gas Accounting and Social Networking for Business offer a number of opportunities to add skills that strengthen one’s current job or provide resources for making a career switch.

Changes In Economy Change Business Practices

As the economic climate changed over the last four years, businesses have really had to buckle down, refine processes and reduce waste.

“Businesses and organizations are requiring employees to do more with less,” says John Claybon, a consultant with Corporate Learning at OCCC.

He says skills and certifications in project management and other soft skills are very big.

“People who have a lot of communication, leadership and problem solving skills are in high demand,” Claybon says.

The University of Tulsa is working with engineers to beef up soft skills and make them more ready for management roles.

Within three to five years of entering the workforce, engineers are generally put into a management position of some sort, says Pat Hall, associate dean of TU’s Continuing Engineering and Science Education program. Engineers are very high performers, she says, but most have no management, leadership experience or training at all.

“Engineers are people who are very smart, but they need soft skills,” Hall says.

Three nights a week for eight months, engineers learn communication, management and leadership skills.

“They learn how to be a leader and understand their team,” Hall says.  

Getting Experience Through Continuing Ed

Often those who do not have job experience can become attractive to future employers or for promotions in their current positions with a boost from continuing education.

Southern Nazarene University offers a Master of Business Administration degree tailored to meet the needs of working adults.

“The experience you gain is way more important than the paper, but the paper is what people look for,” says Cheryl Soerensen-Tuck, marketing and enrollment manager for graduate business programs at SNU.

The MBA in Health Care Administration, she says, has become particularly valuable, as employers have needed people who can understand health care reform and stay abreast of policy changes.

The MBA program takes 22 months to complete and is broken into six-week classes that are taken at night.

“It’s not just reading and taking a test. It is hands-on activities,” Soerensen-Tuck says. “They are actually doing the job.”

The way the classes are structured strongly encourages student interaction. Students are also learning from each other and sharing their experience from the industry they work in, she says.

Additionally, students in some cases are able to cash their work and life experience in for college credit by writing a paper about the experience.

Catering to the Adult Student

Continuing education programs are trying to make education more convenient for working adults through opportunities like leveraging valuable work and life experience as well as online courses and flexible programs. Further moving these classes away from the traditional lecture model and into hands on lab style to provide a more valuable experience.

“Most working professionals like to have hybrid or online courses because it allows for flexibility,” says James Pappas, Ph.D., vice president of University Outreach and dean of the College of Liberal Studies at the University of Oklahoma.

OU’s College of Liberal Studies offers undergraduate and graduate degrees in a number of formats.

As unemployment rates soared and the job market became increasingly competitive during the economic downturn, simply having a degree was important. As a result, Pappas says about 60 percent of people in programs in the College of Liberal Studies at OU have started a degree at some point and are now trying to finish it.

Pappas says degrees that offer a broad range of application for students after graduation are very popular. The bachelor’s or master’s degree in Administrative Leadership, he says, gives students skills to work in a variety of industries and areas.

Mind The Gap

Continuing and adult education programs at colleges and universities keep abreast of employment and training gaps and create programs that meet the needs of both students and industry.  

When the College of Liberal Studies at OU has identified a gap, a demographic study is conducted to see what is happening within that gap to determine if and how relief could be provided through a continuing education program.

Pappas says this process recently revealed the need for a program in prevention science. There was a movement of people with clinical degrees who wanted to be a part of prevention, not just treatment, he says. The school developed an online Master of Prevention Science degree to give the training needed for people to specialize in this area of health care.

Likewise, these programs work directly with employers and industry to find out what they need in a workforce. OCCC created a speech pathology assistant program as a direct response to need for help with speech pathology in K-12.

Energy Shield

Oklahomans have been largely protected from the recession due in large part to the booming energy sector. Almost all colleges and universities with continuing education programs have some course of training, instruction or certification to build skills for Oklahoma’s energy industry.

Cross discipline programs at TU can help people who’ve worked in banking or accounting get an understanding of petroleum engineering. People who work in petroleum engineering can get a basic understanding of geology.

“It helps people switch jobs or helps them learn more about what they need to know in their current position,” says Hall.

OU has worked with the petroleum and energy business to create training programs that are not degree-based. Conferences and courses in oil well blow-out, gas compression and corrosion control provide workers skills and information they need to do their job.

OCCC’s wind turbine program gives students a number of certifications and skills that are widely applicable, particularly in safety.

“When someone has enough safety credentials, employers want you and don’t care what else you know,” says OCCC’s Claybon.

Fill The Gap

In his State of the Union address, President Barack Obama pointed out the need to fill skills gaps. He urged institutions to educate the nation’s unemployed to fill the numerous jobs that were open as a means to ending the nation’s high unemployment rate.

In Oklahoma, the job market is wide open for those in nursing.

“In Oklahoma, if you are a truck-driving nurse you have your ticket written,” says Dustin Pyeatt, spokesperson for the Oklahoma Department of Labor.

The top certifications in demand in Oklahoma are in health care and commercial driving, according to numbers provided by the Oklahoma Department of Commerce. Jobs in repair, sales and accounting also have large numbers of openings.

Continuing and adult education programs position people to take advantage of these gaps. Colleges and universities are making these programs more and more accessible for working adults.