College Acts to Solve Scholarship Problem

The Scholarship Committee has received more financial aid applications for next year than it has for any other year in the College's history.

Tuition and living expenses in the College have increased 50 percent in the last ten years. But income from scholarship endowment has increased only about 17 percent since 1940.

Obviously the College is having difficulty living up to its old standards of student aid. In fact, the above factors have combined to create what the University's top officials call a major financial aid problem in the College.

"Scholarships" now holds top priority along with "Undergraduate Education" among the University's problems of long range concern. President Conant has called for as great an addition as is possible to the scholarship funds in the future. Last year the Scholarship Committee started investigating, and a series of actions began that led to the biggest step that has so far been taken in the direction of improved financial help to Harvard undergraduates; Yesterday the College Financial Aid Center opened to provide coordinated help in the form of scholarships, loans, jobs, and grants for needy students.

The "financial aid problem" is having its effect right now. The average holder of an undergraduate scholarship this year receives $47 less than last year, in spite of the fact that his basic tuition has gone up $75. And the problem promises to get much worse in a year or two. President Conant has said that student scholarships and loans are facing their most severe decline in a great many years. But such a thing is just what the University is working against.

Minimum Standards

Causes of the present need are several, but first the obvious question is "who determines whether or not a need exists?"

In this respect the University is partly causing its own financial aid "shortage" by setting the standards it has. Last Spring the Scholarship Committee decided that at least 20 percent of the undergraduates should be kept on scholarship. It is in trying to live up to this minimum standard that the Committee has had trouble. The policy of keeping at least a fifth of the students on scholarship is, then, what determines the need.

Although the 20 percent minimum may be the ultimate cause of the financial aid problem, there are other causes which make it hard for the Scholarship Committee to keep over the 20 percent line that it has drawn for itself. In 1938 the proportion of undergraduates receiving scholarship help reached 22 percent, and in 1946 it was 26 percent. But this year, in order to keep the number of scholarship holders barely over 20 percent of the student body, the average amount of the stipends had to be lowered. Obviously other factors have arison that make it impossible now for the College to keep both the number and amount of its scholarship awards up to the desired level.

Expensive Education

The main trouble is the high cost of a Harvard education. Like almost every other item on the market today, this popular commodity now costs one half again as much as it did ten years ago. Tuition was then $400. Now it is $600. In an equal ratio with tuition have risen all the travel and living expenses associated with a College career. It now costs a man $1,600 or $1,700 a year to come to Harvard from Chicago according to the Assistant to the Provost, while ten years ago the Chicago student could get by for $1,100 a year.

This inflation has had a dual effect on the scholarship situation. In the first place the Scholarship Committee's money is not as effective as it used to be. In 1940, $400 made a full tuition scholarship. Now it covers only two thirds of the tuition. To give a student the same help he would have received ten years ago, the College must grant him 50 percent more than it would have then. A given amount just does not go so far as it used to. And a Harvard scholarship is just that--a given amount.

Inflation has also made more people need scholarship help. A decade ago a family earning $10,000 could generally afford to son to Harvard. The Scholarship Committee frowned on any applicants who listed their family income as high as $5,000 to $6,000. Now some scholarship students are in a bracket twice this high and still very much in need of their stipend. The higher cost of education partially shows itself in the record number of applications turned in last month for next years awards. About 1200 undergraduates want scholarships, and 1200 applicants for the class of '54 want financial aid along with their admission to the College. Both of these numbers are greater than ever before, even though the enrollment in the College and the number of admission applications have dropped below their former peak levels.

Group IV Scholarships

Another cause of the financial aid problem is the lower requirements for scholarship eligibility. Group three used to be a rigid dividing line. Now a student in group four who distinguishes himself in some extra-curricular manner, will be seriously considered by the Scholarship Committee. By relaxing the group three rule the Committee opened the way for twice as many undergraduate applicants as it had before. This apparently is another cause of the record number of applications received last month.

The disappearance of Gi Bill veterans from the College also aggravates the finance problem. When the College was filled mainly with these government supported students, the scholarship resources were not heavily taxed, for $4,500,000 annually in Government funds supported 75 percent of the student body. But the age of the GI Bill is passing rapidly. Last year there were 1500 men in Harvard College by the courtesy of Uncle Sam. Now there are 1000. Next year there will be 500, and by 1952 the effects of the GI Bill in the College will be negligible.

Deserving Gamblers

Gamblers also add to the financial aid problem. These aren't scholarship students who lose their tuition money in reading period poker parties. They are the entering students who are refused scholarships but who come to Harvard anyway, hoping to make a good record and gain a stipend in their upperclass years. The College feels some obligation toward these men, and they always represent a group of worthy students in great need.

Such is the "major financial aid problem" which the College faces. Higher cost of education has made scholarship money less effective and has made more people need scholarships. Lower qualifying requirements make twice as many men eligible for scholarship award. The losing of the GI Bill means reliance solely on College funds, and numerous students who entered the College on a gamble will be forced to leave unless they get some kind of aid.

Positive Action

The Scholarship Committee seeks a means to take over, in part, where the GI Bill is leaving off. It is now making both immediate and long range progress, and possibly by 1952 when the sudden decline in scholarship help threatens to come, the College will have established an effective system to maintain its financial aid resources.

The first action the Scholarship Committee is taking in meeting its financial aid problem is to use the surplus income that it accumulated during the war years directly for scholarship grants. This will allow one or two more years of relatively normal operation during which the Committee can plan its long range strategy. The annual income from the scholarship endowment is about $375,000, but with the help of the surplus the Committee was able to spend $472,000 last year and it will give away about $520,000 this year.

Only $250,000 remains in the mattress, however. The Committee expects to be able to continue the regular scholarship program through 1951, and the national Scholarship program through 1952, with this money. Then comes the "drastic decline" unless something else is done to augment the annual income from the endowment.

More Capital

Increasing the endowment is the most direct approach. Of the $7,000,000 capital devoted to undergraduate scholarships, $1,000,000 has been given to the College since 1941. But the rise of income that came with this increased capital was not nearly in proportion with the rise in College expenses since 1941. Expenses rose 50 percent, and the income rose only 17 percent. In a like manner it will be a slow job getting enough new endowments to yield the extra 33 percent so that income will begin to match expanses.

Last year half of the 25th reunion class donation to the Harvard fund was turned over to scholarship endowment. This was $50,000, and an equal sum will probably be given from the 25th reunion gift each year. There are also a number of private gifts for endowment which the Scholarship Chairman receives during the year.

Installment Plan

Loans to undergraduates is a method of financial aid that has just become practical and popular enough in the past year to be useful in solving the financial aid problem. Last Spring the Scholarship Committee took a lesson from Yale and MIT and put into operation a greatly liberalized loan policy for this academic year.

Under the new system a needy and risk-worthy undergraduate can borrow up to $400 during each of his upperclass years, and he doesn't need to pay it back until after he graduates. Nor does he start paying the 3 percent interest until he has finished all his schooling.

The Committee has also tried to expand employment opportunities. Last year the employment office placed men in 4200 part time jobs paying $105,000 during the academic year, and in 550 summer jobs paying about $125,000. The office tried to obtain for the needy students about $100,000 more in jobs within the University which regularly go to non-student part time help, but it got only $3,000 worth. There is clearly a large potential source of financial aid right within the University. The student employment office is trying to tap this source.

Such are the ways in which the University in fighting its financial aid shortage. The Scholarship Committee is using surplus funds to tide it over a couple of years. Long range emphasis is on increasing the scholarship endowment. A generous and practical loan system is in effect, and employment opportunities will be increased.

Coordinated Help

Also, a new general headquarters for the College's financial aid will coordinate all help given to students. Starting by going over the individual's budget with him, the Financial Aid Center, which opened yesterday, will follow through by assessing the students need and then coordinating the scholarship-job-loan combination that he receives.

Though the policy will be strictly not to require a student to take a job or a loan in order to get a scholarship, the Center will enable the undergraduate to get the best possible combination of these three that suits his need and ability.

All during its daily coordination work the Financial Aid Center will also be making a study of the financial needs of Harvard undergraduates, so that by the combination of its short and long range activity it may lend toward the solving of the "major financial problem" that plagues the College today.