Saving for College During the Elementary Years

Many of us with children in elementary school dread the day that we're faced with bills for college tuition. We talk about our children going away to college to become veterinarians, lawyers, and even writers and race car drivers (hey, they have their own dreams), but who is going to pay for this education and more importantly, how. Our children may not realize that some of us haven't started saving or that we even need to. Unfortunately, their dreams may be left behind as they step into the adult world.

Whether you have already started building a nest egg or not, there are some easy ways for you to start saving pennies. I'm not going to talk to you about Educational IRAs or investment accounts, although you should definitely consider talking to a financial planner. I'm talking about things you can do now to start saving with no investment on your part.

Save While You Shop
UPromise is a college savings program that lets you "save when you shop for the things you need." With this program there are several ways to save and best of all, UPromise allows you to invest your college savings into a 529 College Savings Account directly from your purchases. You can register your existing credit cards and save when you use them at participating vendors or save more by signing up for their branded credit card. There are still other ways to save, just go to Upromise when you're shopping online and select from their list of vendors (which includes stores like OldNavy, FTD.com and RedEnvelope among hundreds of others). Each participating vendor allocates either a percentage of your purchase or a flat amount to your college savings account. You can also get special deals on things like shipping - just for shopping through UPromise. Another easy way to save is to register a grocery or drug store card. Pick one up from their participating stores (Publix, Winn Dixie, CVS, Kroger, Meijer, and others) in your area and register it with UPromise to start saving on your everyday purchases. Each program works a little differently, but UPromise has over 100 national companies and 8,000 restaurants participating. Overall, it's an easy way to start saving your pennies on many of the purchases you make everyday including groceries, gas and clothing purchases, and you can move those savings directly into a standard college savings account.

Scholarships for the Under 13 Crowd
Even if you haven't started saving yet, that doesn't mean that your children can't. By around age 8 (and sometimes even younger) they are eligible to participate in contests that offer U.S. Savings Bonds and scholarships as prizes. The contests vary from science, writing, art, math, community service, and even designing peanut butter sandwiches. If you're wondering how to find these opportunities, they're just a click away. There are some great online resources that can help you find scholarship opportunities from the elementary years through college.

What, I think, is one of the best free sites for financial aid and scholarship information is FinAid.org. The site is packed with free information to guide you through your college financing. Best of all, this site has a special section that lists scholarships for children under age 13. You can find it by clicking the "Scholarships" link and scrolling down to the section about children under 13. Before you leave, be sure to click on the site map. You'll get an overview of all of the resources available on this site, which gives you an idea of just how complicated this stuff is! This is one site that you'll want to bookmark!

One of the most interesting scholarship programs that I found on FinAid.org - and one I highly recommend you check out for your child of elementary age and above - is the Start Something program sponsored by Target and the Tiger Woods Foundation. This program takes children through a program designed to help them achieve their dreams. It gives them tools to set and achieve a goal, teaches them how to participate in community service, and offers them the opportunity, upon completion, to apply for a grant to further their education - and not necessarily for college. The grants can be used now for children to pursue their goals and dreams in almost any activity that helps them do just that. Some examples the program lists are: Art and Design Camp, Music Lessons, Dance Lessons, and Sport Camps among others. The program requires either a teacher or other qualified leader to help the child complete the program. (A parent may also qualify to instruct her child through the program.) If your child's organizations or schools aren't involved in the program then, take the information to them and see if you can find a sponsor.

If you're searching for scholarships for your middle school, high school or college student, you'll also find information on FinAid.org and most of the information is targeted at that group, but you should also check out FastWeb.com and Scholarships.com. Both of these sites are additional free resources for searching for scholarships. These sites require that your child be at least a high school freshman and/or over the age of 13 in order to register (but that doesn't mean that they don't list some of the scholarships for which children under 13 are eligible). Because of the signup process on these sites, providing information for children under 13 can be a legal hassle (see Children's Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998 (COPPA), USC 6501, Children's Privacy Protection Final Rule). FastWeb also provides a convenient updates via email that lets you know when a new scholarship has been added.

Scholarships provide a great way to inspire your child to get involved, whether it's in community service, science, math, writing, music or another interest, he'll learn that it's never too early to start pursuing your dreams. What a great feeling of accomplishment to start working toward their dreams and possibly earn money for college along the way. As parents, even if we haven't started saving, we can inspire our children to get there and can also find some easy ways to save a few dimes ourselves.