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Facts About
Scholarship America

• Charity Navigator, the nation's premier evaluator of non-profit organizations, has put Scholarship America in its top-ten list of "Slam-Dunk Charities," for fiscal health and responsibility to donors.

• Scholarship America has raised more than $108 million for this fund. Approximately $20 million more has been committed by major donors.

• As of November 2007, a total of 1,352 families had registered with the fund, representing 4,792 individuals.

•As of the same date, Scholarship America had distributed scholarships to nearly 900 people, totaling more than $23 million.

• Scholarship America has kept administrative expenses for family registration, evaluation and issuing awards to 4 percent of total disbursements since 2001. Our expenses for support and fundraising since inception have been $1,589,000 for this $108 million fund, or 1.5% in an industry where administrative costs of 20% are well within the norm.
Overview: Financial Need Formula
Scholarship America's Financial Aid Calculation for the Families of Freedom Scholarship Fund (Information is derived from the most recently filed tax return.)

We start with Adjusted gross income.

We subtract discounts for:
  • Federal taxes paid
  • State, local, property and sales taxes – estimated per state
  • FICA tax
  • Medical costs not covered by insurance that exceed five percent of total income
  • Employment allowance (for families without a non-working parent in the house)
  • Income protection allowance – (to adjust for basic living costs; based on family size)

And add:

  • Income supplement (calculated at 2.5% of liquid assets [cash, checking, savings, and cash value of stocks])

To arrive at:

  • Adjusted available income, used to derive parent or family contribution from the U.S. Department of Education's Need Analysis tables

If more than one family member is attending college, the parent contribution is divided by the number of students.

NOTE: Scholarship America does not factor in retirement funds, value of family residence, nor student earnings.

 

 

 
Amanda Costello is a junior at Marymount Manhattan College majoring in communication arts. Her father worked at Thyssen Krupp Elevator near the World Trade Center; he entered the building to try to help others. The year before 9/11 he had realized his dream when Amanda became the first in her family to attend college. Read more




 
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