Paying for Professional Education

• Each year of Professional school will cost you something in the neighborhood of $20,000-$40,000.
• You can NOT work while attending Professional school!   You may not even get summers off. 
• Therefore, to pay for Professional school:
  •  You will be wealthy enough to pay out-of-pocket, or
  •  A parent or spouse will pay to put you through, or
  •  You will take out standard Professional school loans (financial aid), or
  •  You will enroll in a Scholarship-for-Service program that pays your way.

Your admission to Professional school automatically qualifies you for financial aid.  You are a good risk for such loans because you had to compete with others for admission to the Professional school, so you are already "a cut above"; moreover, your Profession career will pay back the cost of your Professional education many times over, so you will be a good bet to pay off your loans. 

Many people just hate the idea of so much debt. However, bear in mind that your lifetime earnings after graduation will more than justify even a Professional school loan as large as $120,000.  It's the best kind of debt you could ever incur.

Warning: your Professional school loan will cover only what it takes to put you through school.  A living allowance is pre-calculated and will NOT include enough to make a car payment or support dependents such as a spouse or children. 

Warning: As with any lending situation, you MUST have a clean credit record to qualify for financial aid.  It's just fine to have student loans from college, but you don't want to have a credit card balance or a car payment hanging over your head.  There have been instances of students admitted to Medical school who, at the last minute, could not qualify for the loan packages.  In such cases, nonqualifiers are dropped and the admission goes to the next student in line. 

The US Military offers scholarships in return for service in its employ for several years after you graduate from Health Professional school.  Click here to find out more, or contact your local military recruiting office.

Last updated on 04/26/2007.