Minority college grants

Many of the nation's poorest high school students who've academically kept pace with their middle-and upper-class peers won't be able to continue on the college level due to poorly funded need-based federal financial aid programs, such as Pell Grants, said a report by the Advisory Committee on Student Financial Assistance.

The Pell Grant is a federal grant that provides funds based on a student's financial aid. To be eligible, students must be full-time, part-time or less than half-time undergraduates. They also must demonstrate exceptional financial need, and reapply every new academic year.

According to the report, the Pell Grant program has failed to keep pace with college costs. Unless the maximum amount of the grant, $3,300, is doubled, millions of minority students will be locked out of a college education.

The report said rising college costs are hitting poor families harder, with more of their income eaten up by college expenses.

In 1975, the grant covered 84 percent of a student's costs at a public four-year college. In 2000, the grant covered only 39 percent. As a result, many low-income students are forced to work full-time or part-time, cut back on coursework or drop out. The maximum grant needs to be doubled in order to make up for a 30-year purchasing-power gap, said the report.

Given current demographic projections, by the year 2015 an ethnically and economically diverse group of students--80 percent of whom will be non-White--will be applying for college.

Among minority students, more than 45 percent will be from families that can contribute only a minimum amount and must rely on generous financial aid.

President Bush plans to ask Congress to augment the Pell Grant for new college students by 50 percent, and give an added $1,000 to recipients who took college-level math and science courses during high school.