Hawaiʻi students can now keep more of their earned grant money for community college thanks to a new law that revises the Hawaiʻi Promise Program.
Initially, based on a student’s financial need, the Hawaiʻi Promise would grant up to the total amount the student needed to fill any gaps to cover tuition. However, if the student were to receive external scholarships or financial help for indirect costs — things like food, transportation or housing – the program would deduct those amounts from the provided aid.
Act 235 removes this restriction, ensuring additional awards do not hurt the amount of aid a student is eligible for.
Erica Nakanishi-Stanis is the advocacy director at HawaiʻiKidsCAN, a local student success advocacy organization.
“Under the old structure, you thought you had all these costs in hand, and you thought you were working extra hard to be able to meet all the expenses necessary, and then finding out that actually no, because you worked extra hard, you have less now,” Nakanishi-Stanis said. “It was just a counterintuitive and counterproductive structure.”
Advocates said this is a key step toward removing financial barriers for local students considering higher education opportunities.
Since the Hawaiʻi Promise began in 2017, it has served over 12,000 students in the system. According to the University of Hawaiʻi, those that received financial aid were more likely to take on a larger number of academic credits and earn a higher GPA.
The program has a roughly 70% success rate, meaning most recipients of Hawaiʻi Promise aid have earned a degree, transferred to another university or are still in the process of doing either.
Nakanishi-Stanis noted that providing students with a clear picture of what their financials will look like before making daunting decisions can set them up for more success than allowing them to go in blindly.
“If you pair the information of: I know where I can go, and I know how much it's going to cost me, and I know that extra money I gather isn't going to hurt me now, that's a much more powerful financial set of cards to hold in your hand,” she said. “So this law takes the program, which supports hardworking students who've already proven that they have financial need, and ensures that the process of awarding that scholarship doesn't get in the way of actually getting dollars in student hands.”
