A College Dream Deferred?

A young friend of ours whose father is a member of our church graduated magna cum laude from Blue Ridge Community College this spring with a pre-engineering degree and a prestigious math scholarship. He was looking forward to majoring in engineering at Virginia Tech this fall.

But this week he learned that his student loan couldn't be approved unless he had a job that paid $15,000 or more a year or had someone able to cosign for him.

What? I thought student loans were designed for people just like him?

Meanwhile he is looking for a local drafting or construction job to help him save money to be able to enroll next year--unless some miracle happens and he can arrange for a different kind of loan for this fall.

I'm not well versed in financial matters, but I'd be glad for some feedback on this. I had been under the impression that student loans were almost too easy to get, even for students far less likely to succeed than a hard working 4.0 GPA pre-engineering student.

I'd welcome your comments.