All three Carroll County Representatives in the Georgia House voted in favor of a bill that should make more technical college students eligible for the HOPE grant. House bill 372 would change the eligibility requirement to obtain a hope grant to a 2.0 grade-point average. That’s down from the current rule of 3.0 and a return to what existed before lawmakers overhauled hope in 2011 to prevent it from going broke.
 
West Georgia Technical College, Vice President of Institutional Advancement Dawn Cook said this week that the previous raise in the GPA requirement was at least partly to blame in the slowing of enrollment numbers over the last year.
Nearly 9,000 students statewide lost the hope grant last year because they couldn’t maintain a 3.0 average.

House bill 372 now heads to the senate for approval.