The rising cost of higher education is a heavy burden on students around the world. The University of Texas- Austin has taken a significant step to provide free tuition to their undergraduate students from families that make less than sixty-five thousand USD per annum.
The University of Texas-Austin (UT Austin) is all set to support more students from middle and low-income families with free tuition through an endowment amount of one hundred and sixty million USD.
This commitment will be a blessing to many talented students in Texas as the median income in a Texas household was less than sixty thousand USD as per US Census in 2017.
The distribution of free tuition is divided into two categories:
- Families with annual income up to sixty-five thousand USD: more than eight thousand six hundred undergraduates from these families will be given free tuition.
- Families with annual income up to one hundred and twenty-five thousand USD: five thousand seven hundred students from these families will get tuition support.
To qualify for this endowment, students have to be undergraduates for the first time and should be residents of Texas. They are required to maintain a 2.0 GPA throughout the course, in addition to being full-time students.
Earlier this year, a similar scholarship of free tuition for eight students was set up by comedian Steve Harvey for Kent State University.
UT Austin is not the only university to identify this need to support low-income families in Texas. Rice University provides free tuition for students from families that make less than sixty-five thousand USD annually.
The source of free tuition money
The governing body of UT Austin is led by Chairman Kevin Eltife and Chancellor James B. Milliken. The board passed the resolution unanimously to distribute this fund from the state’s Permanent University Fund.
The Permanent University Fund(PUF) is a unique system in the state of Texas where over two million acres of land is leased to oil and gas companies, and the revenue from this gets accumulated in PUF.
While announcing the endowment, Chancellor Milliken said,
“There is no greater engine of social and economic mobility than a college degree, and this initiative ensures that more Texans will benefit from a high-quality UT Austin education. The use of Permanent University Funds to invest directly in students demonstrates the strong commitment of the Board of Regents and UT Austin to the values of public higher education.”
