William Smith, who graduated from Utah State University in May, found out firsthand the difficulties involved with getting an assistantship. “I was on the waiting list at Ohio State,” he said. “When the admissions rep called me to tell me I hadn’t made it, she apologized. She said that usually everyone on the waiting list was taken. But this year, with the recession, and the competition, and the desperation, everyone accepted and no one from the waiting list received an assistantship.”
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While fellowships and assistantships are nice, most graduate students have to resort to loans. Even for those who receive assistantships and some scholarship help, there is usually a funding gap. Mark Kantrowitz, the publisher of FinAid.org and FastWeb.com, two Web sites devoted to helping all students find financial aid, pointed out that loans make up the bulk of funding for graduate students. “Graduate financial aid tends to boil down to a few basic types, but it’s mostly going to be loans.”
Kantrowitz recommends that graduate students turn first to federal student loans. “You can get Stafford loans for $20,500 a year when you are a graduate student. Beyond that, you can apply for Grad PLUS loans. You should only turn to private loans after you no longer qualify for federal loans.”
While you can find private graduate student loans through Web sites like TERI.org, there is also an increasing interest in using peer-to-peer lending to fill the funding gap. TuitionU is designed as a P2P source for student loans. And, of course, there are the old P2P standbys, Prosper and Lending Club.
For married graduate students, there is one more time-tested method of covering living expenses while in graduate school: “Often, one will work while the other gets a degree, and then they switch,” Kantrowitz said. “No matter your method, though, only one source of funding is likely to prove inadequate. You should explore as many options as possible.”
