Grants can take some of the pressure off paying online college tuition as a student works toward their degree. These forms of tuition assistance are available to adults, as well as high school graduates, and they typically don’t have to be repaid.
Clinical lab technicians have become essential members of any medical team whether they operate out of a major health care institution or a successful private practice. These techs test any blood, cell or other samples a physician or nurse practitioner supplies for whatever malady the patient is going through. In many cases they even provide a diagnosis. As of 2008, there were over 300,000 such techs working in the country. The Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates there’s a need for an additional 14% by 2018. This is a growth rate that exceeds the national average for white collar professionals and many will get into this field through an online degree program.
They could be seen as turning lemons into lemonade. Adults in this sluggish economy with high unemployment rates are reportedly using the time to update their skills and train for new jobs.
As the economy slowly crawls its way toward recovery, many people are still out of work. That means there are still more job applicants than jobs and anyone who’s looking for work needs anything extra that will help them stand out. Some people consider going back to school, especially distance learning college courses that allow them to keep a job they may have.
One thing that’s been slowly happening since Barack Obama became president is a steady overhauling of college financial aid. The most recent is the introduction of the American Opportunity Tax Credit. At the same time, educational tax credits are not new. They’ve been around for nearly a decade. That doesn’t mean Obama hasn’t worked them over. Those earning college degrees online and at a traditional college would do well to understand all these provisions.
Actually, another credit was already there. Called the Lifetime Learning Credit, it was introduced in 2001 with the Hope credit. The Lifetime doesn’t offer as much as the Opportunity credit, yet it covers a larger portion of the population. So one should take the bad with this greater good.
