September 26, 2018
College savings for everyone
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Photo courtesy Normandy Schools Collaborative Kindergartners give a presentation on career options at a 2016 school board meeting. Thanks to the College Savings Program, many Normandy students will have a little help in making those plans a reality.
Beyond Housing partners with Normandy schools to provide students with funded college savings accounts By Charlotte Beard The Beyond Housing organization’s 24:1 Initiative to take on challenges in the 24 municipalities of the Normandy school district to foster stronger communities continues. For almost six years now, their two college savings programs, The Promise Account and the Viking Advantage Program, are continuing for Normandy students. Both are voluntary programs and not dependent on grades achieved while in school. The Promise Account starts kids who enroll in the Normandy Collaborative’s kindergarten program with $500 in a Missouri 529 savings plan (MOST 529). The savings account helps off-set the costs of post-secondary education pursuits and gets its name from Section 529 of the Internal Revenue Code, which specifies
the plan’s tax advantages. Chris Krehmeyer, President and CEO of Beyond Housing, states that a parent can sign their child up for the account at the time of enrollment in school. It is Beyond Housing’s way of saying “we believe in you and you’re going to do great things with your life. Here is the community investing in you.” Krehmeyer shared that there are almost 1,800 active accounts. The Viking Advantage Program for Normandy High School juniors and seniors is Beyond Housing’s collaboration with Express Scripts Foundation and other funders to provide a match of $3 to every $1 saved in a student’s college savings account. Krehmeyer shared that the maximum match
is against $500 which could yield a funding of $1,500 for one account. To sign up for the college accounts, students must complete an application, which is available through the high school guidance counseling office. “The matched savings program is more limited in nature because of the need to find the match,” stated Krehmeyer. “We have a funder that funds the Promise Account, we don’t have a dedicated funder to fund the matched savings every year. We (must) raise dollars to put that program in place. We open as many of those accounts that we can with the funding that we have.” At the beginning of every school year, See ‘COLLEGE SAVINGS’ page 2
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