Campus announces Illinois Commitment tuition program

U of I will cover tuition and fees for qualifying students

Through a combination of institutional, federal and state aid, including Pell Grants and Monetary Award Program grants, Illinois Commitment will provide financial awards to cover the tuition and campus fees for in-state students whose family income is less than $61,000, the current median family income in Illinois.
Through a combination of institutional, federal and state aid, including Pell Grants and Monetary Award Program grants, Illinois Commitment will provide financial awards to cover the tuition and campus fees for in-state students whose family income is less than $61,000, the current median family income in Illinois.

A new financial-aid program aims to make attending the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign more affordable for qualifying families in the state of Illinois.

Illinois Commitment will provide financial awards to cover the tuition and campus fees for in-state students whose family income is less than $61,000, the current median family income in Illinois.

The program will be open to freshman and transfer students beginning with the entering freshman class in fall 2019. Through a combination of institutional, federal, and state aid, including Pell Grants and Monetary Award Program grants, freshman students who meet the program’s criteria will have the financial aid necessary to cover the cost of tuition and campus fees for up to eight semesters of continuous enrollment on the Urbana campus. Transfer students will be covered for up to six semesters of continuous enrollment.

“We established Illinois Commitment to ensure that even more high-achieving students in our state have affordable access to the kind of life-changing educational experience you can only find here at Illinois,” said Robert J. Jones, the chancellor of the Urbana campus.

“We’re acutely aware that a number of students in our state who could be part of the Illinois family never even consider applying, simply because they don’t believe that they could afford to attend the Urbana campus,” Jones said. “As a public university, we must see to it that talented students of all economic backgrounds in the state of Illinois have access to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. With Illinois Commitment, we’re taking a bold and necessary step to simplify the financial-aid concept and open the door to an Illinois education for more families in our state.”

In the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, the new program comes in addition to the Lincoln Scholars Initiative, launched in 2010 with the renovation of Lincoln Hall, which provides scholarships for a select number of academically strong admitted Illinois residents with financial need. The Lincoln Scholars initiative provides $5,000 per year and students are notified in advance of the acceptance deadline, allowing them to factor the scholarships’ support into their decision.

The scholarships are renewable with a potential value of $20,000 over four years, providing access to a liberal arts and sciences education for bright, accomplished students whose financial situation might prevent them from enrolling at Illinois.

“We have worked hard for a long time to make an LAS education available to students in Illinois with financial need. We believe it is our duty as a land grant university to do so,” said Feng Sheng Hu, the Harry E. Preble Dean of the College of LAS. “We are thrilled that the Illinois Commitment program will help carry out this endeavor on an even larger scale.”

Illinois Commitment was created after listening to students about why they were choosing to attend college out of state, said Kevin Pitts, the vice provost for undergraduate education at Illinois.

“In-state students repeatedly told us that cost and the lack of a scholarship were the primary reasons why they decided to decline our offer of admission,” Pitts said. “We are currently investing $90 million in institutional aid to lower the cost of attendance for approximately 43 percent of undergraduate students. Illinois Commitment represents a significant additional investment to encourage the best and brightest students in the state of Illinois to enroll at the flagship campus, regardless of their family income.”

The program will not affect the federal and state aid available to other Urbana campus students, including those who don’t qualify for the program, nor will it affect other merit-based scholarship money a student may have earned.

Illinois Commitment makes the U of I a realistic postsecondary option for many high-achieving students throughout Illinois who may have previously thought it was out of reach for financial reasons, said Erinn Murphy, the college and career counselor at Carbondale Community High School in Carbondale, Illinois.

“The program illustrates the U of I’s dedication to supporting – in a very real way – college education for qualifying in-state students, and I expect that in-state applications submitted this year by eligible students will increase.

“Illinois Commitment has the potential to be a complete game-changer for students who meet the criteria and are accepted into their program of choice.”

News Source

Phil Ciciora, Illinois News Bureau, and Samantha Jones Toal

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