Nearly every state in the country gives college students financial aid based on financial need.

Georgia is among the two that do not.

Advocates who want to see that changed contend the policy is harming the economy by reducing the number of college students who earn a degree after suffering academic setbacks, and by driving high school graduates to attend college in other states, forever forsaking Georgia.

Georgia has a lottery-funded scholarship, but HOPE is distributed based on academic performance in high school rather than financial need, and students lose the scholarship if their college grade point average drops too far.

That is what happened to Jordan Winfrey, a Kennesaw State University student who testified at a legislative hearing Thursday about the affordability of higher education.

Winfrey wants to be a nurse, in a state that needs more of them, but she struggled with chemistry. Her grade point average fell, she lost HOPE and now, a junior, she works 30 hours a week to cover the loss.

She has been trying to improve her grades and recover HOPE but has found that difficult while holding a job. 

“If I were able to work fewer hours, I’d be able to focus more on my classes and see my grades improve,” said Winfrey, a native Georgian and the first in her family to attend college.

She said all her friends are struggling too, with some dropping out to work.

Taylor Ramsey, executive director of One Goal, which helps students like Winfrey, said fewer than half of high school students qualify for HOPE, and more than 40% who do wind up losing it in college, falling into a downward spiral like Winfrey, “when we pull the rug from under them and take away that financial aid.”

It affects everyone, said Ray Li, a lawyer with Legal Defense Fund, a racial justice group. It drives up student debt, creating a drag on the economy when graduates must pay back loans instead of, say, buying a house. Georgia has one of the highest average college loan debt rates in the country, he said.

And the lack of financial aid for low-income families is driving a “brain drain,” he said, as talented students choose college in other states that will give them “needs-based” financial aid “because it is cheaper to go somewhere else and they’re never returning to the Georgia economy.”

Li said Georgia has the lowest percentage of high school graduates who stay in state for college in this region of the country. He recommended joining the 48 states that offer needs-based aid, by funding it with $126 million in reserves held by the Georgia Lottery. He argued that Georgia would recoup the cost many times over in income taxes paid by graduates.

It is unclear how convincing his recommendation will be for the Georgia General Assembly. Sen. Max Burns, R-Sylvania, attended Thursday’s hearing as a member of the committee studying college affordability. He suggested another course: consider making it easier for students to recover HOPE after their grades drop too far.

“Good students have challenges especially in that first year or that second year,” said Burns, chairman of the Senate Higher Education Committee and a former President of Gordon State College in Barnesville.

Lt. Gov. Burt Jones, a Republican running for governor, authorized the study committee. Sen. Nan Orrock, D-Atlanta, who leads it, said her panel will write formal recommendations after its next and final hearing Dec. 2.

Capitol Beat is a nonprofit news service operated by the Georgia Press Educational Foundation that provides coverage of state government to newspapers throughout Georgia. For more information visit capitol-beat.org.