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Bill passes, MAP grant funding for fall

The Illinois Legislature passed a bill Friday, April 22, which Governor Bruce Rauner signed Monday, April 25, allotting $600 million for higher education. This bill includes funding for the Illinois Monetary Award Program, or MAP, as the budget impasse finishes its 10th month.

MAP grants are awarded to low-income students to help them cover college costs. The funds for the MAP grants have been withheld as the Illinois state budget remains unapproved.

“[The bill] basically covers one semester’s worth of MAP grants, so this kind of gets us caught up for the fall,” Brad McMillan, executive director of Bradley’s Institute for Principled Leadership in Public Service, said. “But the answer to the spring MAP scholarships has not yet been addressed.”

About 1,000 Bradley students receive MAP grants, which totals $4.3 million.

“The university has taken a position that they’re allowing the students [who receive MAP grants] to stay in school, and we are just going to continue in every way possible to encourage the legislature to eventually fully fund the program,” McMillan said. “Some universities have … not allowed [students] to return to school unless they come up with alternative financing, and Bradley has not taken that position. We obviously want our students to stay here.”

According to McMillan, Bradley’s strategy is to encourage students to speak up about how MAP grants affect them.

“We wanted to activate our students who receive MAP scholarships to contact their local legislators and the legislators that represent the Bradley area,” McMillan said.

Groups of Bradley students traveled to Springfield, once in March and once last Wednesday, to meet with legislators face-to-face and share their personal stories about why MAP grants are important to them.

“They let their voices be heard very loud and clear,” McMillan said. “Some of the students that go down there talk about how they are the first generation to go to college, how they come from a single-parent household, how they already work one or two jobs to try to be able to afford college, and that this $5,000 a year is a very critical piece for them to be able to stay in college at Bradley.”

Olga Krapivner, Student Senate’s Vice President of Academic Affairs, said while she doesn’t receive MAP funding, she believes it was important for her to go to Springfield.

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