CAROL’S SUMMARY: President Obama signed an economic-stimulus law back in February giving $200-million for Federal Work-Study. This will help create more work-study jobs for students with financial need.
Work-study jobs help students with financial need go to college and are predicted to help the economy because the students’ wages go to either tuition or housing. Tuition money helps pay faculty salaries that they use toward goods purchased and housing money turns over into the local community-boosting the economy.
Questions to consider:
1. Have you considered a work-study job?
2. Who could you talk to for more information on work-study jobs at your school?
3. How will work study prepare you for success in the world of work?
ARTICLE:
By BECKIE SUPIANO,
From the Chronicle of Higher Education, February 19, 2009
Washington
The $200-million for Federal Work-Study in the economic-stimulus law that President Obama signed this week is expected to help an additional 130,000 students, each earning an average of $1,500 a year, according to government estimates. The money, despite rumors to the contrary, will not be pegged to a new community-service requirement.
Rather, an Education Department official said, the money “will be distributed to colleges by April 1 based on existing formulas and information that colleges have already submitted” to the department. Colleges will then be able to give undergraduate and graduate students the money next academic year.
Congress has not yet set the overall level of support for Federal Work-Study for fiscal year 2009. In recent years, the program has received about $980-million, and higher-education lobbyists believe lawmakers will not lower that amount. So the extra $200-million could push the total pot of money over a billion dollars, a height it reached in 2001.
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