Twitter Chat: Merit vs. need-based scholarships

In America, many scholarships are given out based on merit, handed out to students who have good grades and high test scores. While this plan is meant to attract the best and the brightest, it can also mean that money goes to students whose families can already afford college, bypassing those who can’t. This, in turn, can contribute to the wide graduation gap.

Now, however, some schools are choosing to do away with merit-based scholarships, and instead giving out only need-based awards. To discuss this phenomena the NewsHour held a Twitter chat at 1 p.m. EDT Friday on merit-based versus need-based scholarships.

We were joined by Troy Onink (@TroyOnink) who writes about financial planning to pay for college for Forbes, Sara Goldrick-Rab (@saragoldrickrab), a professor of Educational Policy Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Daniel Porterfield (@DanPorterfield) President of Franklin and Marshall College, Jamey Rorison (@IHEPTweets) Senior Research Analyst at the Institute for Higher Education Policy and representatives from the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators (@nasfaa).

Here are some of the highlights from that chat:

PBS NewsHour coverage of higher education is supported by the Lumina Foundation and American Graduate: Let’s Make it Happen, a public media initiative made possible by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.