The federal government has a new grant program that starts today for students who plan to become teachers. The name of the program is the Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education, or TEACH, for short. The program provides up to $4,000 per year in grants for 4 years to undergraduates. Graduate students may qualify for $4,000 a year for 2 years. To qualify for the grants the student must maintain a certain grade point average and agree to teach in a “high need” subject in a “high need” school for at least 4 years within 8 years of graduation.
The biggest catch to this grant program is that if the student fails to follow all of the requirements, the grant turns into an unsubsidized Stafford loan. The Congressional Budget Office is estimating that 80% of students receiving the grants will fail to complete the program. Those students who do not complete the program will potentially have the standard loans that many students receive and if they don’t complete the program will have the additional loans from the converted grants. In other words, these students may have the worst of all possible worlds with higher loans than other student
This program again points out the risks involved in many parts of the college admissions process for the uninformed. Knowledge truly is power and as students and parents facing the world of college admissions, you owe it to your self to be an informed consumer.
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