Churches Helping College Students During an Economic Downturn
By Scott Smith, BCM Director at Lander University

This week I had the opportunity to meet with some of our Financial Aid and Development Staff at our university. We discussed the financial hardships that college students are going to face in the upcoming months especially with financial aid. These experts in the field shared that invested monies have dramatically dropped in their return yields and thus students will be getting less monies in the future. Each institution has endowment monies that they invest and they use these yields to give institutional scholarships. This is not the same as scholarships received through state grants and scholarships and federal scholarships and grants.

In the not too distant future, churches will see their college students receive less scholarship and grant money directly through college institutions. How can a church help?

1). Set up a college scholarship fund for your college students to receive funds directly through the church.

2.) If you have an apartment of other housing near a college campus consider renting to college students.

3.) Help purchase books by sending a check to the college business office with the student’s college ID or social security number. (Check with the student to make sure that this doesn’t jeopardize any other scholarships the student might be receiving.)

4.) Meet with all of your students to specifically pray for them and their needs. The upcoming months will be a difficult time for all students in the area of Financial Aid.