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Forty-one thousand students began a new year today at Florida State University. They were greeted with a fifteen percent increase in tuition over last year, and for many, Bright Futures scholarships that are just a little dimmer. Bright Futures Scholarships no longer cover 100 percent of tuition but are a fixed amount. That’s lead a lot of recipients to start looking for work or take out loans.

“It’s harder for students,” Julian Arenas, a student from Naples said. “Basically, for the people who have no support from their parents. They have to take out loans, they have to either work and spend less time in school. I think that’s one of the problems.”

“It’s really hard for the rest of us to pay for tuition entirely because I only have Bright Futures,” Sara Dejan, from Odessa, FL. “And since it no longer actually covers 100 percent, even though it says it does, it’s just really difficult for myself and my family, to take care of a college education when we don’t quite have the funding anymore.

Despite the fee and tuition increases, Florida State, like other state universities, is making due with its fourth straight year of budget cuts.