Permanent residents and U.S. citizens get the same financial aid benefits — usually.

Although both have the same access to most of Syracuse University’s financial aid and scholarships, permanent residents — who do not have citizenship status — may be restricted from applying to private or special scholarships, including the recently announced Louise and Howard Phanstiel Scholar Program.

‘That’s just the nature of the private scholarships,’ said Kaye DeVesty, director of the Office of Financial Aid and Scholarship Programs.

Just as there are scholarships that require applicants to be a specific major or to be from a certain state, there are scholarships that require applicants to be U.S. citizens, although they are not as common, DeVesty said.

The Phanstiel Scholar Program, for instance, will provide scholarships to SU students who are U.S. citizens and come from middle-class backgrounds beginning in the 2011-12 academic year.

The $20 million donation from the Phanstiels will support a private scholarship program, said Youlonda Copeland-Morgan, associate vice president of enrollment management and director of scholarships and student aid. The way this gift was put together by the donors requires eligible students to be U.S. citizens, she said.

The requirements that define which students are eligible for private scholarships are determined from within the organization providing the scholarship, Copeland-Morgan said. The donors will take into consideration the advice received from members of the organization or from attorneys who help set up the scholarships, among other things, she said.

The Phanstiel scholarships are meant to focus on aiding students of middle-class backgrounds. The U.S. citizenship requirement is less important, Copeland-Morgan said.

‘In a world where you have significantly huge institutional funds, citizenship is just not something that we focus on,’ Copeland-Morgan said.

But Jenny Ahn, a senior English and textual studies and psychology major, said not including permanent residents for the Phanstiel Scholar Program eliminates a lot of potential middle-class applicants who might need the scholarship.

Ahn was a permanent resident from South Korea before becoming a U.S. citizen about two weeks ago. If the Phanstiel Scholar Program had been available while she was a permanent resident, Ahn said she would have been disappointed because she would not have been eligible to apply.

But Copeland-Morgan said SU invests $178 million dollars in need-based and merit-based scholarship programs, which are available to both permanent residents and U.S. citizens. So there is an array of SU scholarships available for students who are not eligible for the Phanstiel Scholar Program, she said.

‘That one grant is not going to make a difference for their ability to come to Syracuse,’ Copeland-Morgan said.

Permanent residents and U.S. citizens usually are not distinguished from one another in enrollment and financial aid, said Don Saleh, vice president for enrollment management. A distinction is usually only made between people in the United States and international students, he said.

‘So if you are a permanent resident, we just move students through in the same way we do as a U.S. citizen,’ Saleh said.

Ahn, the senior who recently became a U.S. citizen, said although she has seen several scholarships that require applicants to be U.S. citizens, she has not had a problem finding other scholarships to apply for.

‘If you really wanted to go look for a scholarship,’ Ahn said, ‘you could find other options.’

Shkim11@syr.edu

Published on October 26, 2010 at 12:00 pm