A majority of parents say they are concerned on how they will pay for their kid’s college education, CNBC reports.
As the coronavirus pandemic takes a financial toll on people, many parents report they are worried about how they will pay for their child’s higher education.
A recent survey by Discover Student Loans found that 68% of parents of college-bound students are more worried about paying for college because of the pandemic.
Poll results show:
- 53% of parents say their child’s plan for college has changed because of COVID-19.
- 67% of parents say they still believe college is a good investment for their children.
- 55% of parents say they are concerned their child is not receiving enough in scholarships, which is a 14% jump from March's survey.
Some parents say their kid's plans for college has changed due to the virus outbreak meaning they will now attend a school closer to home, delay attending school for a year or choose a less expensive school to attend.
The survey polled 1,500 parents of college-bound teenagers in early March and again in May.
“As you would expect, the pandemic has put some strain in families’ finances,” said Manny Chagas, Discover’s vice president of student loans.
Another poll conducted by NitroCollege.com found that 69% of parents and 55% of students starting college this fall say the coronavirus has impacted their ability to pay for school.
“I’ve never seen students and parents this anxious this time of year,” Eric Greenberg, president of Greenberg Educational Group, a New York-based consulting firm told CNBC. “We have a lot of families talking about starting at community colleges or in-state schools or taking a gap year.”
Nearly 40% of parents say they have had to dip into their child’s college fund to help pay for other expenses during the pandemic, according to a survey by LendingTree. Another 15% of parents asked reported not having a college fund for their kids at all.
CNBC reports that there likely will be an increase in student loan requests to help people pay for college.
According to the Institute for College Access & Success, about 7 in 10 college graduates owe about $30,000.
A 2020 high school graduate could finish college owing about $37,200 in loans, according to a NerdWallet analysis of data from the National Center for Education Statistics.
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