ADMISSIONS

Q. What percentage of SCCO students use financial aid?
A. During the past five years the figure has been between 90-92%.
 

Q. What kinds of financial aid resources are available?
A. There are loans, scholarships/grants and work-study jobs. These resources currently provide a grand total amount of over $14.3 million annually.
 

Q. What percentage of the financial aid resources are grants and scholarships?
A. The grand total amount consists of 8% grants or scholarships. 91% of the aid available is in the form of loans and currently totals over $13.4 million.
 

Q. What does it cost to go through SCCO's program?
A. The students who graduated in May 2012 paid $126,757 for the direct costs of tuition, books and instruments during their four years of attendance. The full budget, including living costs for four years was $199,456.
 

Q. What kind of debt burden do SCCO students graduate with?
A. The average indebtedness level of the eighty-nine students of the Class of 2012 that took out loans was $154,090 and debt levels ranged from $2,500 to $225,761.

Q. Do these figures include undergraduate debt?
A. No. About 49% of the Class of 2012 students entered with loans from their undergraduate colleges. The average undergraduate debt level was $15,100.
 

Q. Can you estimate student loan monthly repayment amounts?
A. Yes, the graduates from the Class of 2012 had an average estimated monthly repayment amount of $1,773 but the amount ranged from $50 to $2,857 based on a 10-year repayment period .
 

Q. What income level can our students expect after graduation?
A. The average net income from the primary practice of optometry was $132,052 in 2010, the most recent statistic available. (Data from 2011 AOA Economic Survey.)
 

Q. What is considered a "manageable" debt level?
A. Past studies have suggested that annual repayment amounts should not exceed 15% of expected income. On an indebtedness of $154,096 we estimate a monthly loan repayment amount of $1,975 and an annual loan repayment amount of $23,700. This would represent about 15% of the median net income amount mentioned above. An extended or graduated repayment plan could lower the monthly payment amount, if needed, in the early repayment years.
 

Q. Are SCCO alumni able to repay their student loans?
A. Yes. Our cohort default rate on our Direct Loan programs has been zero for the past 12 years.
 

Additional Questions?