<p>I'm wondering if someone with experience/knowledge on the subject would address how most students pay for medical school--the competitive nature of financial aid/scholarships, what the loan process is like, tips you may have for financing, etc. Nephew will have no UG loans, parents are firm that med school is to be on his own 'dime'.</p>
<p>Loans are the primary source of paying for medical school. If interested in working with the military, there are opportunities like the HPSP (Health Professions Scholarship Program) that require you to be accepted to a medical school (with, I believe, a certain GPA and MCAT).</p>
<p>These types of programs will typically offer a bonus, a stipend while attending medical school, and a full ride, and require a year-for-year trade; for every year in medical school, you will commit one full year to serving in the military branch that extended the scholarship to you. This typically means working as a Doctor at a military hospital either stateside or abroad, but they won’t send a 400k doctor to the front lines to shoot guns; that’d be tossing their money down the drain. I also think a 6-week basic training “light” is required, where I believe standard skills are learned (it’s not as rigorous as infantry basic training by a long shot).</p>
<p>Other than the HPSP and loans, there really isn’t much a typical medical school student can expect. Merit scholarships are–I believe–very rare. Why would a student need help paying for school when they’re going to be so “rich” in the future? It’s stupid logic.</p>
<p>Hopefully this helps. Perhaps some other posters will be able to help you further, or correct any mistakes/assumptions I’ve made.</p>
<p>Almost $40K a year in Federal Stafford loans/year. The rest made up from private loans. If parental income/asset info is provided, a student may qualify for need based grants or lower interest institutional loans at some generous schools. Merit aid is sometimes independent of parents info, but sometimes parental info is required. Either way, merit money is not anywhere near as common or as much as for undergrad. </p>
<p>So, yeah. Mostly all loans for the full-boat for students whose parents are “above the need-based line” at generous schools. At less generous schools, it’s just all loans, all the time for almost everybody.</p>
<p>It is not unusual for a med student to have $240-$260K in loans from med school. (I think I may have seen the percentages at each debt level. I wonder where?)</p>
<p>250k in debt certainly happens, but that is much higher than the mean. More typical is around 150. Hardly spare change. Yes, in most fields you can pay it off, but factor in years of residency, and if you go into the relatively lower paying fields it can take years to get it paid off. </p>
<p>On the other hand, most people end up thinking it is worth it. HOWEVER, there are people in primary care, still saddled with 250k debt years into practice, cannot buy a house, not sure how to educate thier kids, who are not living the lives they expected as doctors.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.aamc.org/programs/first/debtfactcard.pdf[/url]”>http://www.aamc.org/programs/first/debtfactcard.pdf</a></p>
<p>Thanks for the link, afan. That is what I remembered seeing. (Those numbers are pretty frightening to me. 1 in every 5.5 private med school students has a $250K debt. And 1 out of 2 at $177,500 or over. Jeepers. )</p>
<p>Anyone have sources where I can find information on either schools with scholarships/reduced fees/whatever or loan forgiveness programs for people planning to work in primary care for underserved communities (likely urban Hispanics rather than underserved rural)?</p>
<p>entomom, for the first part
you can pretty much copy 80% of my D’s app list. pm me and I’ll create one fwiw. For the second part
I got nothing.</p>
<p>And if the scholarships you are talking about are for primary care, then I got nothing for either. Sorry.</p>
<p>The timing of this thread is interesting as today is the day on sdn that JHU sent their FA awards out. You could hear yelps of real pain. Lots of students apparently didn’t realize that FAFSA EFC of zero doesn’t mean diddly at JHU. </p>
<p>Every student who had zero income last year and zero assets has a zero FAFSA EFC. Somehow they missed the part about parental income and assets being considered before any institutional grants are made. FAFSA EFC just qualifies you for loans. </p>
<p>So “suck-tastic” was their response to FA awards consisting of $43k loans when the COA is @ $65K. “Where does the other $20K+ come from? Do they just expect me to borrow that, too?” Yep. That’s what they expect or they expect your family to pay it. “But my EFC was zero.” So what? We calculated it higher. “But my parents won’t pay.” </p>
<p>For many, this is their first go-round with FA. It’s pretty depressing over there.</p>
<p>^The reason to consider in-state?</p>
<p>I went to JHU’s FA website and it was pretty clear what was about to happen. It seems that the students might have fallen asleep at the switch. JHU did have an interesting statement, though. The said that they were attempting to equalize the amount of debt each graduate had. It makes sense but I just hadn’t thought of it that way.</p>
<p>There is a program that grants medical school loan forgiveness in our state (Kansas) for those who agree to work in an underserved area. This program is only open to certain specialities. I did some searching and came up with this list. Not sure if this is what you were looking for or not.</p>
<p>[Loan</a> Repayment/Forgiveness and Scholarship Programs](<a href=“Loan Repayment/Forgiveness/Scholarship and Other Programs”>Loan Repayment/Forgiveness/Scholarship and Other Programs)</p>
<p>^ I’d rather pay out of pocket.</p>
<p>I do think that most parents would be willing to help out espcially if their children (medical school capable) attended a state UG school with substantial scholarship.</p>
<p>MP, that helps a lot, thanks!</p>
<p>MiamiDAP, If you have some of the funds in the bank, what is the advantage of spending it immediately vs. taking loans and hoping for a forgiveness program later? If a forgiveness program doesn’t come through, then you could immediately pay off some of the loans; is there some faulty thinking or something I’m missing in this line of reasoning? Not trying to question your approach, I just want to make sure I understand the full picture. Thanks, EM</p>
<p>There are students who would jump at the chance at a loan reimbursement/forgiveness program and others who would have nothing to do with one. It would be a very individual choice. Our town is considered “underserved” and we have had several family medicine doctors set up practice here over the years, “serve their time”, and head on to whatever they consider to be greener pastures when their debt has been paid.</p>
<p>Our D will begin the whole arduous med school application process this summer. H, D and I have discussed different ways to fund a medical school education (IF she is fortunate enough to get an acceptance). In the annual review of our life insurance, etc. policies with our agent a couple of years ago, he pointed out that there is a fair amount of $$$ built up in the cash value of the policies. We can borrow it with no interest, she could pay it back to us with no interest when she is out in practice and not have to worry about it beforehand. She could also not pay it back and that amount could be deducted from her “inheritance”. Just a thought rumbling around right now, but an interesting one.</p>
<p>You are welcome Entomom!</p>
<p>One downside to the forgiveness/reimbusement programs would be that they are limited to only certain specialities - usually primary care. I do know of an enterprising young man who went to a state school honors program undergrad, fully paid.
He went to a state medical school, did an internal medicine residency, and worked in an underserved area as an ER doctor to “pay his debt”. He is now in an oncology fellowship with no debt!</p>
<p>entomom,
I do not trust current government with anything, I do not want loans from current government. I do not know about advantages vs disadvantages. I did not pay UG tuition becasue D. had full tuition Merit scholarships. I do not have funds, but I can draw my 401k w/o penalty and I am planning to do so. However we both work (praying every day that it will continue), loan-free, no other dependants. So, we might no buy our next car, it is OK, we will survive.</p>
<p>We plan on helping with the cost of medical school but my daughter will take out loans and pay the bulk. I’ve already paid 200k for undergraduate. Now its her “investment”.</p>
<p>Obviously if the family can, and is willing to, help pay for medical school, then there is no problem. Many medical students come from families that cannot make any meaningful contribution. For those students it is debt, and hopefully loan forgivenss programs.</p>
<p>It is a fine plan to start in primary care, work off the loan forgiveness, then enter a different specialty. However, this requires both being admitted to such a program after years of primary care- hardly assured, and wanting to be a resident or fellow again after being in practice- again not everyone will want to do this.</p>
<p>This is such a timely thread. </p>
<p>D1 (the physics & math kid) is starting her process of wending her through the med school application process. She sits for her MCAT in 2 weeks and is already drafting about her personal statement. She has a list of possible schools, mostly chosen because they are friendly to physical sciences majors. She hadn’t really considered how these school compute financial aid. Assumed she’d get loans based on her FAFSA. </p>
<p>I hadn’t realized that some schools will want her parent’s financials-esp. given that D1 has reached the magical age of 24 and she’s self-supporting.</p>
<p>And I guess it’s also a good thing she isn’t even considering applying to JHU…</p>
<p>Just to clarify, D1 actually wants to go into primary care and work with underserved communities long term, not just as a means for reducing Med school costs. She has had experience during HS at a local low income clinic, with her mentor during SMDEP and now at a low income clinic near her college. At least at this time, she has no plans to enter a different specialty. </p>
<p>So, my thought was that even though we will have some funds left after UG, it might be wise to take out loans rather than pay outright with the thought that she might be accepted to a loan forgiveness program after finishing.</p>
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<p>Are loan forgiveness programs usually only offered to people after working several years? I’d assumed that many would also go to new grads who were willing to work in underserved areas, is that incorrect?</p>