Hudson works at the University of Maryland as a Financial Aid Counselor. He spends every weekday advising students and parents through presentations and one-on-one sessions about ways that they can afford college. Having worked in the same department for over three years, he can confidently say that financial aid is possibly the most boring and scary part about a college visit. He said that several parents have even fallen asleep during his financial aid talks (honestly, I can’t really blame them! :) There is so much information to take in, and the numbers seem so big that even thinking about them can be overwhelming – let alone paying for them.
But paying for college is one of the biggest and most important financial decisions people ever make, so it is important to have a plan and not just ignore it because it is boring.
That’s why, when we were given the opportunity to host a College Ave Student Loans information session, I was determined not to have anyone fall asleep during the party. Just because it is about college loans doesn’t mean that the party has to be boring! So I decided to host a murder mystery dinner / pizza party for some of our friends and take the opportunity to share with them about College Ave Student Loans and how they can help pay for college (after scholarships and grants, of course).
If you’ve never done a Murder Mystery Party, you have to try some time! Each person is assigned a character and dresses up to fit the part. Each round, you ask questions to other players and try to piece together the information. At the end of the game, you guess who you thought was the guilty person.
Something that made this particular murder mystery really interesting and different was that it was set in Roman times, so there were 18 of our friends wrapped in bedsheet togas, sitting around our apartment, trying to solve the mystery! It was a little difficult to take everyone seriously as they tried to act out their characters!
Only one group ended up guessing the right person (and it definitely wasn’t us). But even though we didn’t win, we had a lot of fun and got to try something a little different. Hud said that it was the best financial aid talk he ever had (and this time nobody fell asleep! :)
College loans are an important topic to learn about, whether you are working to pay off your own or planning for your kids’ college. While we fully believe it is better if you do not have to take out a loan, for many people it is necessary. Hud said the biggest thing is just being educated about the cost of school and the options to pay for it. He aid that he sees so many parents and students show up at freshman orientation and admit that it is their first time actually thinking about how they are going to pay for school!
College Ave Student Loans has just launched a new Parent Loan, which offers an average savings of $1,000 when compared to the Federal Direct Parent PLUS program. And their parent loan offers more flexibility than other private parent loans. There is also the ability to share the responsibility of the loan by co-signing it with the student, so that the student also feels a shared responsibility in paying for their college education. If you would like to see if you would qualify for a College Ave loan, College Ave and Experian are offering a limited time joint offer of a free, personalized credit education session with an Experian Credit EducatorSM agent.
I was selected for this opportunity as a member of Clever Girls and the content and opinions expressed here are all my own.
