Financial Aid

Nearly 300 pages of sensitive student financial-aid data found in a West Chester University trash bin 12 days ago were not shredded because they were placed in a recycling container, according to a report released yesterday on a university investigation. But the report did not detail how the documents found their way into a bin about a mile from the financial-aid office. The documents, which listed names with Social Security numbers, financial-aid disbursements and student identification numbers, were discovered July 29 by an East Bradford man walking his dog near the university's football stadium.

He was just out walking the dog. But when he came to a trash bin behind West Chester University's football stadium, the dog owner said, he made a startling discovery: a computer printout listing the Social Security numbers and other personal data for hundreds of students. The East Bradford man, who asked not to be identified, retrieved some of the documents Thursday and gave them to The Inquirer, which then recovered more than 300 slightly stained spreadsheets. It was unclear on Friday whether the university violated a federal law that prohibits schools from haphazardly discarding such private information or making it available.

The Princeton University board of trustees yesterday unanimously approved a plan that is expected to reduce or eliminate some of the financial burdens placed on low- and middle-income students. The new financial assistance measures will be available to all students when the school year begins in September. There are two parts to the plan. First, students from families with annual incomes of $40,000 or less will no longer have to take out loans, but will receive university grants for that portion of their tuition - usually about $4,000 a year.

The day after you gave birth, you did two things: You called your relatives to announce the news, and you opened a savings account for college in your child's name. Now, 18 years later, as you are helping your child apply for financial aid at Very Big University, you are learning the ugly truth. All those years of careful saving for tuition - of buying Subarus instead of Saabs, of vacationing in Sea Isle City instead of Spain, of eating at Burger King instead of Bookbinder's - may have actually penalized you. The harried financial-aid officers at VBU - like those at Small Private College - are dealing not only with thousands of applications but also a flurry of new, contradictory federal regulations.

Save, save, save! Got that? And then save some more. Earlier this month, some parents were flush with pride when the annual cascade of college acceptance letters rolled in to teenagers. Those letters were soon followed by the financial aid packages schools had put together - designed to convince families that their $10,000 to $30,000 price tags for a year of higher education are affordable. Depending on a family's wealth, those aid packages could tap into a dizzying array of programs, from federal grants and loans to money from the college's own coffers.

Rutgers University students are finding it easier to lay their hands on financial aid, a new report says. But they're going to need it. The cost of their education will go up next year. The amount of financial assistance and the number of Rutgers undergraduates receiving it sharply increased last year - after the school joined a federal program allowing students to borrow through their academic institutions rather than banks, says a new Rutgers report. About 20,600 university undergraduates saw their aid jump in the 1994-95 school year by an average of 24 percent, or $1,188.

Whoever is crowned president of the University of Pennsylvania when Judith Rodin retires next summer has it made, right? The place could run on autopilot - or so it seems. The Ivy League institution, the city's largest private employer, is riding high. It is flush with a $3 billion endowment. Its health system is back in the black. Its business school is ranked tops in the nation. It has impressive new buildings, improved relations with the local community, and reduced crime. It is ranked in the top 10 among national research universities.

In a move made two months earlier than usual, Temple University yesterday approved its lowest tuition increase in 13 years and gave financial aid the largest one-year boost in its history. The state-related university usually waits to approve its spending plan until closer to Pennsylvania's budget adoption so that aid dollars can be best predicted. But officials said yesterday that they wanted to give families more time to plan how they will pay for college, given the economic turmoil.

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology, defending itself against charges of price-fixing in student financial aid, yesterday accused the U.S. Justice Department of seeking to "patrol the hallways and campuses of academe" by forcing school officials to give scholarships to students who don't need them. In an 82-page brief filed yesterday in U.S. District Court in Philadelphia, MIT said the Justice Department's allegations that MIT had violated federal antitrust law, if upheld by the court, would erode the university's long- standing policy of giving financial aid solely on the basis of students' economic need.

College students busted for drugs may soon have more to worry about than the police, the courts and their parents. Congress is ready to take back their financial aid. Under next year's higher education bill, currently in a House-Senate conference, the Department of Education would be able to suspend federal loans and grants for students convicted of using or selling marijuana or other illegal drugs. The punishment is meant by Congress as another signal to young people that experimenting with illegal drugs could have disastrous consequences.