Sallie Mae Fund and Harris Interactive. 2003.<em> Financial Aid: The Information Divide.</em> Accessed August 1, 2007 from http://www.thesalliemaefund.org/smfnew/news/2003/news_nr184b.html.<br />
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This survey was conducted for the Sallie Mae Fund by Harris Interactive and involved 1,090 telephone interviews of parents and 811 students aged 18 to 24. The study reports vast inequalities among students and parents in terms of possessing financial aid information. Many parents and students are not aware of basic sources of financial aid and can not name scholarships or grants as a source of financial aid. Low-income and Latino families tend to get financial information later than upper income and other families. Lower income and minority parents are also less likely to identify common sources of financial aid. Nearly half of all parents wish that they had more information about paying for college. This study is part of a three-year initiative of Sallie Mae's called Project Access, which was designed to improve access to higher education, targeting underserved populations through increased media exposure, distribution of bilingual educational materials, and scholarship endowments.