Requiem for the "forgotten" middle class

Have you been paying attention to the debate over
the future of Bright Futures? (Bright Futures is the
Florida's state-funded, merit-based scholarship
program.)

State analysts have been warning us year after year
about how unaffordable the program has become;
now, with the economy in shambles, the debate has
reached a shrill crescendo.

How will it change? Probably by making the standards
higher to earn (a recent study shows that (95% of
all incoming UF freshman qualified). And almost
certainly by exempting some tuition costs - in other
words, some of the rising cost of attending college
here in Florida will not be covered by Bright Futures.

But check this out quote from former chancellor
Charlie Reed, "one of the dumbest policies I know,
to give rich people financial aid to go to the state
schools..."

What prompted this outburst? A survey showing
that the median annual income of students'
families was $100,000 and that almost 25% of
UF earned more than $150,000 per year.

I don't know about you, but most people I know
earning income in that range do not consider
themselves "rich." In fact, a lot of parents that
College Pete and I consult, whose earnings are in this
neighborhood, feel downright poor when
contemplating sending one or more children to
college with costs between $17,000-$55,000 per
year, per child!

Talk about the "forgotten" middle class!

Also, ex-chancellor Reed seems to be ignoring the
legislative intent, or purpose of Bright Futures- to
encourage the best students to stay in Florida and
thus contribute to our economy. Reed's looking
at Bright Futures as a social engineering tool, not
a merit-based one.

If you're a middle class, or even upper middle class
parent struggling with how you'll ever be able to
afford college education for your children, my
advice is to consider schools outside of the state
of Florida in addition to our state universities.

Why? Because many "high sticker price", private,
out of state schools offer extremely generous
financial aid packages to parents earning six-figure
incomes.

My other piece of advice is to do your research
early; i.e. second half of your student's sophomore
year or junior year at the latest. You don't want
to be blind-sided by learning how much college
really costs when it's too late to do anything about
it.

Knowledge is your best defense. One way to
arm yourself is to attend on of our upcoming
free community workshops,

"Financial Aid's Dirty Little Secrets Revealed!"

We cover:

* How even Millionaires can save $30,000 on
college costs;

* The single biggest mistake made by "Forgotten
Middle Class Parents" when applying for financial
aid;

* "Closely-guarded" college funding loopholes; and

* A heck of a lot more.

www.CollegePlanningAdvice.com/events

Register now while this is still fresh on your mind -
don't put it off any longer.