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Blacks, Low-Income Students Less Likely to Retain HOPE Scholarships

By Brian C. Browley
Black College Wire

Tennessee government and education officials are concerned that African Americans and students from low-income families are not qualifying to retain their Tennessee Lottery HOPE scholarships in sufficient numbers.

Tennessee promotes its HOPE scholarships

According to the Tennessee Education Lottery Scholarship's Annual Report for 2005-06, some 5,771 recipients statewide were from households with incomes of $36,000 or less. Of this number, 3,178 failed to retain the award, or 55 percent.

Conversely, more than 7,000 of the awards went to students from homes with incomes of $75,000 or more. Of this group, only 42 percent (2,917) failed to retain their award.

Richard Rhoda, executive director of the Tennessee Higher Education Commission, said students who were awarded HOPE scholarships based solely on their high school GPAs were retaining the scholarship at a lower rate than those who met the criteria based on their ACT scores.

According to the report, 57 percent of the first-time freshmen recipients who failed to retain their scholarship had scored a 21 or below on the ACT. The report also stated, "an ACT score greater than or equal to 21 and a requirement merely of 22 would have resulted in a loss of 80 percent of the scholarships granted to African-Americans in Tennessee."

The report went on to state, "lowering of the eligibility requirement to a '20' or '19' would still prevent 60 and 46 percent (African-Americans), respectively, from receiving aid."

However, state Sen. Thelma Harper, D-Nashville, a Tennessee State graduate, attributed the retention rates to a continual increase in the eligibility requirements for the scholarship, which was created by a 2003 law.

"You've got poor people playing the lottery and wealthy people benefiting from it," Harper said. "The average ACT score is 18. I thought it was mean-spirited when they raised" the requirement "to 21 because it gave the appearance that they were trying to eliminate a certain segment from higher education.

"I think you will see a movement to raise it even higher based on what [Rhoda] said about TSU's scores are lower than any other schools in the system," she added.

Tennessee State dropped from having 534 recipients in 2004-05 to 531 in 2005-06, the only institution in the state's public college system to show a decrease.

Statewide, the report said that 73 percent of students who received HOPE would not have been eligible if Tennessee "had followed the path of sister programs and tied eligibility solely to performance of a 21 on the ACT."

It also said that while 47 percent of white students failed to retain their lottery scholarships as sophomores, 63 percent of African American students lost their scholarships over the same time. Of the 2,315 African American students awarded HOPE scholarships, 1,459 lost the award after their freshman year.

"It's long-term and we're learning with this program," Rhoda said.

Even though students may lose the award after their freshman year, there are provisions to appeal the loss of their scholarship, according to Robert Biggers, lottery scholarship administrator for the Tennessee Student Assistance Corp.

"We know that young minds . . . may not make that hurdle and stumble academically, so provisions were made to give students another opportunity to regain the award," Biggers said.

Rhoda said that roughly 40 percent of Tennessee State undergraduates are from out of state and are therefore automatically ineligible for the scholarship.

Brian C. Browley, a student at Tennessee State University, writes for the Meter.

Posted Oct. 25, 2006