“Dream Fund” for Dreamers
Colo. Mtn. College helps undocumented students pay for their higher education
Undocumented students at Colorado Mountain College now have the opportunity to earn their degrees without paying a dime upfront through a firstofitskind funding model that lets socalled Dreamers wait until they graduate to repay their education through a fixed percentage of their income.
The program — called Fund Sueños, which translates to “the Dream Fund” — is designed to assist undocumented students, including those eligible for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, who can’t obtain federal financial aid to help pay for a college education.
“We have a pretty large number of Dreamers in our mountain resort communities, and this is designed to help support young people that are often left behind,” said Carrie Hauser, president of the 11campus, Glenwood Springsbased college. “This is not at the exclusion of the other students we serve. It’s our way of hopefully contributing to the conversation and to be part of something we hope can inspire other institutions.”
To be eligible, students must be at least 18 years old; be currently enrolled at Colorado Mountain College in a degree or certificate program; be unable to utilize federal financial aid; and, if not a U.S. citizen, be eligible to work.
The program operates through an incomeshare agreement in which eligible students receive $3,000 per year — covering the full cost of tuition and fees at Colorado Mountain College. In turn, they agree to pay the school 4 percent of their earnings over a maximum of 60 months after they graduate — if they’re making at least $30,000 a year.
Students who don’t make the minimum of $30,000 annually don’t have to pay anything back. Once the 60month period is over, even if students haven’t finished paying off the money they were gifted, the incomeshare agreement ends.
Private donors fund the program entirely, with no institutional funds or contributions from state or federal aid, college officials said.
Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals is the Obamaera program that has allowed 17,000 Coloradans and hundreds of thousands of Americans brought to the United States illegally as children to have legal presence in this country. The program, which the Trump administration rescinded last year, doesn’t allow recipients to receive state or federal financial aid.
“The undocumented students were committed to graduating and getting a job, but they were
taking one class at a time because they didn’t have the access to additional aid and had to work and balance that to pay for class,” said Matt Gianneschi, Colorado Mountain College’s chief operating officer. “It was delaying their ability to go to class and become a nurse or a firefighter or whatever they were pursuing.”
Leaders at the college had been brainstorming over how to financially assist the hundreds of undocumented students they have spread out over the institution’s 11 campuses, from Glenwood Springs to Rifle to Carbondale and beyond. When Gianneschi attended a presentation this summer on incomesharing agreements, he had a light bulb moment.
“This might not be the answer, but it could be an answer,” Gianneschi said.
A news release from the college said incomesharing agreements were a more equitable financing system for lowincome and firstgeneration college students than traditional loans, and ensured the institution had a stake in the students’ success: “If they don’t succeed after college, neither do we.”
The pilot program, which begins this fall, still contains uncertainties related to potential federal immi gration policy changes.
“We knew that there is a possibility that these students could lose their ability to work in the United States with immigration reform,” Gianneschi said. “We don’t know the ultimate outcome of what might happen with the program.”
Two donors underwrote a $50,000 pilot program so the college could assure students that, in the event there’s a change in immigration law and they can’t finish the program, their debt would be vacated.
Carol Segal, cofounder of Crate and Barrel and a member of the college’s board of overseers, is one of the inaugural donors.
“I am hopeful that these efforts will inspire others to explore new, innovative ways to support DACA students and others who struggle to make the dream of college a reality,” Segal said.
A local donor, Tom McMahon, is Segal’s codonor. Colorado Mountain College officials hope to attract other donors along the way.
The inaugural class of 10 participants in the Fund Sueños program is made up of students currently registered at the college and within a year or so of graduation, which will allow administrators to get the incomesharing aspect working as quickly as possible to sort out any wrinkles.
When Gianneschi no ticed the early August meeting to announce the plan to the community was scheduled for a Friday night, he thought surely no college students would show up.
“I walked into the room, and it was packed,” Gianneschi said. “There were families, parents, graduates who wanted to tell their siblings and friends.”
The money the students pay off postgraduation replenishes the fund for future users — an aspect of the program Gianneschi said delighted students.
Universities across Colorado have created funds to help financially assist undocumented students. The University of Northern Colorado invested about $400,000 in institutional aid that provides each undocumented student with about $4,000 toward their education. The University of Colorado Boulder created a private student relief fund that has received more than $60,000 in donations since its May 2017 inception.
“Sometimes western Colorado is out of sight, out of mind,” Hauser said. “It’s nice to be able to be part of something that could be applicable to the rest of the state and maybe other institutions out there.”