Two weeks ago, students, counselors, and families recognized College Signing Day, an amazing annual event spearheaded jointly by #ForeverFirstLady Michelle Obama’s Reach Higher Initiative and Better Make Room, which celebrates high school seniors’ decision to pursue either some form of post-secondary enrollment or a role in the military. In practical logistical terms, for many students pursuing a post-secondary credential, this meant celebrating that students had sent in their deposits to formally commit to their future colleges.
We at Beam, formerly Edquity, love College Signing Day from a culture-building standpoint; students should celebrate — and be celebrated for — their achievement of checking off another major milestone on their journey to a post-secondary credential or a military career.
It’s important to remember, however, that College Signing Day and students’ financial commitments to their schools aren’t a finish line. Rather, the financial journey for students is truthfully just beginning.
The next milestone? Getting through the summer financially and showing up to college in a position to financially succeed.
Every year, anywhere from 10 to 40 percent of students succumb to a phenomenon known as the summer melt: where students intending to matriculate to college fail to enroll in the fall. There are a whole host of nuanced issues, not all of them financial, that can induce this terrible outcome. Those that are financial, however, can be devastating.
