Dimanche 29 avril : Michel Berson a rendu hommage aux victimes de la déportation et des camps de concentration

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[Rédigé par : Preetham]

merit grants aucconted for $2.08 billion, or 28%, of all state-sponsored grants awarded in its latest tally, covering the 2006-2007 academic year. That's up from $458.9 million in 1996-1997, when merit-aid aucconted for about 15% of all state grants.But the economic crisis has raised fears that such growth may be unsustainable, as tax revenue plunges and legislatures make drastic cuts to other state programs. And the pinch comes just as layoffs and investment losses affecting millions of families are likely to boost demand for financial aid based on need.[edit]Though state appropriations for higher education are often among the first items cut in a recession, most legislatures have in the past avoided tampering with merit-scholarship programs out of fear of a political backlash. Cutting them would be a direct hit to the pocket books of students and families, says Dan Hurley, a policy analyst at the American Association of State Colleges and Universities, a trade group.Tougher StandardsFaced with a budget deficit that has grown to $2.1 billion, New Jersey recently revised its Student Tuition Assistance Reward Scholarships, or Stars. The result is a new statute, signed into law in December. It mandates tougher qualification standards and smaller scholarships for a program that aided about 5,000 students a year.Originally available to high-school students who graduated in the top 20% of their class, Stars covered tuition and fees for two years at a county college, as community colleges are known in New Jersey. Students who earned a 3.0 average there qualified for a second scholarship that paid for the same costs for two years at a state university.Now, students will have to take a college preparatory curriculum in high school and graduate in the top 15% of the class. They must maintain a 3.25 average in community college to qualify for the university scholarship, which will be linked to grades and limited to no more than $7,000 a year. Students from families earning more than $250,000 no longer qualify.Jane Oates, executive director of the New Jersey Commission on Higher Education, said there were educational reasons for tightening eligibility standards: About 30% of the students who got the merit awards needed remedial courses once they got to the community colleges.But funding was also a huge issue. A task force chosen to advise Gov. Jon Corzine on the matter estimated that, with the economic downturn, demand for the scholarships could quadruple in a single year. That would have been devastating, said Ms. Oates, who served on the panel.Feeling BetrayedChristine Collazo, a 20-year-old from Perth Amboy, N.J., has been attending Middlesex County College on a Stars scholarship and says she hopes eventually to become a math major at Rutgers University, where tuition and fees total $11,562 this school year. A part-time deli worker, Ms. Collazo says she will apply for financial aid and loans to help cover the costs Stars will no longer pick up. But to be honest with you, she adds, I kind of feel betrayed. Meagan Plichta, a visual-arts major at Middlesex, was planning to use her Stars scholarship to move on to Rutgers like her older sister, Lacey, also a Stars recipient. The daughter of a school secretary and an ironworker, she is not so sure now. What they are offering now isn't even comparable to what they were offering, the 19-year-old says. If I was offered a scholarship somewhere else out of state, I would go there.