For college students and graduates, already facing a collective $1 trillion in debt for their education, the fiscal cliff threatens to reduce financial aid available and strip some help for paying student loans.

“Cuts in these programs will push college, and the social and economic stability it provides, further out of reach for millions of families,” said Rich Williams, higher education advocate with the U.S. Public Interest Research Group.

If automatic cuts take effect:

• About 5,200 fewer Ohio students would receive the Supplemental Education Opportunity Grant since $2.57 million could be cut in the state, according to the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee Majority Staff.

• About 2,260 fewer Ohio students would receive financial assistance from the federal work study program if $3.2 million is cut in the state.

• Colleges would have to cut either 50,000 student employees or reduce the hours or wages for up to 680,000 students under an $85 million cut to the federal work study program, Williams said.

• 11 million families nationwide who claimed the American Opportunity Tax Credit will see that credit eliminated, Williams said. The credit is worth up to $2,500 per student each year, and would revert to the lesser Hope Scholarship Credit, according to the National Association of College and University Business Officers.

• The student loan interest deduction, which allows individuals earning less than $60,000 or couples filing jointly at $120,000, to deduct up to $2,500 in student loan interest, would revert to an older law only allowing deductions in the first five years of repayment at a more limited income, according to NACUBO.

Additionally, originating fees on federal student loans would increase slightly, and Congress will have to act again by July 1, 2013 to keep the interest rate on subsidized Stafford Loans from doubling to 6.8 percent. And although the federal Pell Grant, the cornerstone of federal financial aid, is exempt from the fiscal cliff, it does face a massive $6 billion funding shortfall in 2014-15, Williams said.

Institutions are also bracing for reductions to their research if automatic cuts to the National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation and Department of Energy take effect, according to NACUBO.

Staff writers Barrie Barber, Steve Bennish, Jackie Borchardt, Margo Rutledge Kissell, Chelsey Levingston and Meagan Pant contributed to this report.

Read more about those in jeopardy in Ohio:

Fiscal cliff effect on local:   Agriculture  |  Health care  |  National security  | Local/state governments  |  Jobless benefits  |  Financial markets  |  K-12 education  | Colleges and universities

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