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When my grandson lost his Navy scholarship and commission at the last minute because he was colorblind, my son took all of the scholarship money he had accumulated over four years, and went to local med schools to see if they could get him in. It was a considerable amount of money in the six figures. The upshot was that when he got his medical degree, he would ONLY owe $80,000 and his Dad would ONLY owe $60,000. Whatta deal! The schools were eager to take him.

Fortunately Sen. Lugar helped him get around the exclusion and got him an Army commission and scholarship. He just arrived at Ft. Bennington for his basic training and will enter med school school in January.

He won’t get to go to the Naval Academy like he’d planned (his Dad was Navy) but it’s still a good deal. Both the Naval Academy and now Purdue were both happy to take the scholarship dollars.

Kids almost have to make a career starting at the end of 8th grade of qualifying for scholarship money. And if they work hard and achieve their academics, the last year of high school they can take courses with dual credit, which saves them almost a year of books and tuition.

One of the problems today is that school counselors are not working aggressively with kids to guide them through the process. They sit in their chairs and take up job space and sit back and wait to be approached. Grandson was lucky he got the right counselor who stuck with him all the way through and it’s really paid off. Arm your child with a counselor who’s not afraid to earn their money. They scoured everywhere for scholarship money right from the start and by doing that it also helped make the right connections, even from a farm in the boonies of Indiana.

And if they want to serve their country in the process, they have to start getting the attention of their Senators in their Sophomore or Junior year because the Senator is only allowed so many slots to fill each year. When grandson approached Senator Bayh, he turned him down flat as he already had applications backed up for three years. Senator Lugar takes all applications, and lets the chips fall where they may. The many fall out of the academic 98 percentile in their senior year.

It is an abomination that getting an education takes so much money, because it turns the process of just getting into college to political gamesmanship and makes one become government dependent, if your aim is high and you’re not flush with money. All grandson wanted to do was become a military doctor specializing in burns and skin recovery for returning vets. One of his uncles came home from the battle of Fallujah with his face arms burned off.