For Oregon high school students, the reward for good grades could soon be a cut in the price of an Oregon university education.
As an incentive to send more Oregon high school graduates to the state’s universities and also to highlight the importance of academic achievement, some state senators have sponsored the “Oregon HOPE bill.” Proposed in early April, the HOPE bill, an acronym for Helping Outstanding Pupils Educationally, would provide scholarships to Oregon high school students who graduate with a ‘B’ grade point average or higher.
Critics of the bill include organizations such as the Oregon Students Association and the Oregon Students of Color Coalition, which argue that under-funded need-based grants should take priority over merit-based aid. OSA representatives say that the Oregon Opportunity grant, a need-based program, is already denied to more than 11,000 students who need aid. This should be fixed before new scholarships are created, they said.
But the bill’s supporters say that if they can get the funding they want, they could fulfill both need-based grants and the HOPE scholarship.
Sen. Ryan Deckert, D-Beaverton, a University alumnus, is co-sponsoring the bill with Sen. Tom Hartung, R-Cedar Mill. Deckert said he hopes to approve the bill in the Legislature this year.
“Its main goal is insuring that more Oregonians go to college and have the opportunity to attend institutions in Oregon,” he said.
The bill closely mirrors Georgia’s HOPE scholarship, which began in 1993 and gives scholarships to students with a 3.0 GPA and high SAT scores. Alma Bowen, communications manager of Georgia HOPE, said the program has proved successful, helping 578,370 students and boosting Georgia high school SAT scores.
“It was put in to place to really change the thinking of students, to make them aware that studies and good grades were important,” she said.
While Georgia HOPE funding does not come from state funding — rather, it comes from a lottery system — the Oregon HOPE version would have to use state funds. Representatives from the Deckert office said that Oregon lottery funds already go towards other state projects, such as infrastructure plans.
Julie Suchanek-Ritchie, communications director at OSA, said more than 11,000 students who needed the opportunity grant for college this academic year had to be turned away because need-based grants are underfunded. To accommodate everyone who needs money to go to college, the funds would have to increase by $17 million, she said, and the HOPE scholarship is estimated to cost nearly $22 million.
She added that the HOPE scholarship would give money to students who probably already have the means to go to college and would have a negative impact on lower-income students and minority groups.
“Basically, merit-based aid takes scarce state dollars and gives it to students who are already academically and financially able to go to college,” she said.
But Deckert said that in contrast to Georgia’s scholarship, the Oregon bill would also consider students’ financial well-being to ensure that the scholarship only benefits those coming from lower- and middle-class families.
Deckert also said alternatives for the scholarship’s funding have been looked at, such as using money from the state’s unemployment insurance to ensure that the scholarship wouldn’t take money away from need-based grants.
Amy Scholerman, an OSA board member and senior at Western Oregon University, said that instead of working on merit-based programs, the state should focus on ensuring that all students eligible for the need-based grant get money and that it should also increase the amount of need-based money granted.
As a low-income single parent, Scholerman has struggled to pass her classes and work at the same time. And because of the lack of state funding, her need-based grant only covers two terms of the year. As tuition increases, she has to work even harder to make up for the loss, she said.
“Books and living expenses are increasing, and the need-based grant hasn’t kept up,” she said.
Currently the bill states that if a student is granted money from both the HOPE scholarship program and the Oregon Need grant, the scholarship will be paid with funds from the opportunity grant.
Melissa Unger, ASUO legislative organizer, said she is concerned about this part of the bill because students with lower incomes who need federal funding would not be helped by the HOPE scholarship.
But Deckert said he plans to amend that part of the bill. He said he would make the HOPE scholarship and the need-based Oregon Opportunity grant be two separate entities, so one would not affect the other.
The Senate Education Committee will discuss the bill later this week and vote on whether or not it should get passed on to the Committee on Ways and Means.