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• 1 media/Finances Pic.jpg media/financialAid492x251.jpg 2018-12-09T22:05:49-08:00 Student Financial Aid 41 image_header 2018-12-10T18:07:16-08:00       College and the cost of it is a major subject in today’s world, as more and more jobs require some type of degree. At the same time, tuition at most colleges continues to rise, making financial aid an asset to the majority of students. Because of these factors, tuition and board rates, along with financial aid are two of the main aspects students pay attention to when considering colleges. According to the National Center for Educated Statistics, 85% of college students in the United States received some sort of financial aid for the 2015-2016 school year.[1] Arkansas State University is known for offering large amounts in financial aid, and that number has continued to increase for years.
   
        The A-State website contains Factbooks that give stats for each academic year, including tuition rates and financial aid for the year. This scatter plot chart shows dollars (in millions) given to Arkansas State students through scholarships, loans, government grants, and work-study from 1984 to 2017. (Factbooks only contains aid information from 1984 forward, and no information was made available on aid before that year.)
      
        There is almost a steady growth in every category, except work study, which stays around 3 million. It is obvious student loans have always had the highest amount in dollars of the categories, starting around 8 million in 1994, tripling between 2004 and 2005, and landing right above 90 million for 2017. The amount in grants given stays higher than the amount given in scholarships until 2013 when the amount of grants drops over 20 million dollars.
        There does not seem to be any correlation between each categories increases and decreases. Loans continue to have the highest amount and this could very likely have to do with the factors such as 1) this type of aid is the only one that can be used
   on finances other than A-State tuition/ A-State room and board, and 2) the cost of living rising each year (in both on campus and off campus housing).
  
        
   
  
  
       
  
  
  
   
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
       This bump chart contains the same information as the scatter plot above, but portrays it in a different way where you can visually see the large differences in the amount between the categories verses numbers used in the scatter plot. 
  
  
  
     
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
      
  
  
       Below is a chart showing A-State tuition rates every five years from 1986 to 2016. (Factbooks only contain aid information from 1986 forward, and no other information was made available.) Tuition rates have steadily risen, the biggest jump being between 2001 and 2006 when tuition rose by $2,550.00. By looking at both charts, it seems as tuition rises so do the number of student loans taken out, and the number of scholarships awarded.
  
   

  year	resident	non-resident
  1986	$882.00	$2,082.00
  1991	$1,410.00	$2,660.00
  1996	$1,930.00	$3,620.00
  2001	$3,160.00	$7,096.00
  2006	$5,710.00	$12,760.00
  2011	$6,934.00	$14,860.00
  2016	$8,200.00	$14,260.00

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  [1]U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics. (2018). The Condition of Education 2018 (NCES 2018-144),Sources of Financial Aid.