Education

Dartmouth Vows To Eliminate Loans For Students With Family Income Less Than $125,000

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Chrissy Clark Contributor
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Dartmouth College will eliminate loans for some undergraduate students and replace them with “expanded scholarship grants” beginning June 23, according to a press release from the university.

President Philip Hanlon said the university is removing “all federal and institutional loans from its undergraduate financial aid awards,” according to a Dartmouth press release. The loan removal program was propelled by more than $120 million in scholarship gifts and pledges to Dartmouth’s endowment fund.

“Our gratitude for these extraordinary acts of generosity knows no bounds,” Hanlon said.

The university boasts that families with an annual income or less than $125,000 who receive “need-based financial aid” are eligible for the scholarship. Dartmouth’s press release claims that the plan will “decrease the debt burden for hundreds of middle-income Dartmouth students and their families by an average of $22,000 over four years.”

Dartmouth stated that 450 undergraduates undertake financial aid loans. The university estimates that the program will eliminate “ as much as $5,500 in required borrowing for each student per year.”

Applicants for the Class of 2027 will be the first undergraduates to receive these scholarships. (RELATED: George Washington University Retires Colonials Moniker To Be More ‘Inclusive’)

The program also aims to eliminate “parental contribution for families with annual incomes of $65,000 of less” and “extend financial aid support to undergraduates studying off campus.”

More than 65 families committed a total of $80 million to the Presidential Commission on Financial Aid, which was established in 2020 amid academic hardships brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Dartmouth joins Brown University, Columbia University, Harvard University, the University of Pennsylvania and Yale University in adopting no-loan policies, according to the New York Post.