Graduate and Professional Students’ Financial Hardships During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Evidence from the gradSERU COVID-19 Survey

Abstract

This report points out findings from the gradSERU COVID-19 Survey regarding graduate and professional students’ financial hardships during the COVID-19 pandemic. The results of the survey suggest that first-generation graduate and professional students—those whose parents have not earned a bachelor’s degree or higher—were significantly (p < .05) more likely than their continuing generation peers to experience unexpected increases in spending for technology, loss or reduction in a scholarship, loss of reduction of insurance coverage, and loss or reduction of income from other family members.