How does a person afford graduate school?

If possible try to get a job after you earn your undergraduate degree that will offer you tuition assistance, some better companies offer about $8,000 or so per year.
Also you may be able to work at the university and qualify for reduced/employee tuition rates. Good luck!

First of all, when you enter graduate school, your loans get deferred. You may have to apply for that. Most financial aid depends on the college you attend. If you go to a public university for a doctorate, you may have to go the loan route because there are fewer scholarships available. Most of the cost of the education is being underwritten by taxpayers. If you go to a private school, much if not all is paid for by endowment, scholarship, school jobs and whatever financial aid the school can come up with to help you out.

Rather than just hoping for the best, score well on whatever entrance exam you need to take. Apply to three or so schools. When you interview, tell them you will need financial aid to go. Select the school that gives you the best package offer.

I went to library school because I ended up by accident on the college campus of a place where I had once thought very seriously of attending to get a Master’s in Library Science. I did not at the time think that I would ever have the opportunity. I had just married someone who decided he wanted to get a Ph.D. to teach in a college. So, he applied and the place that offered him the best package was the school where I had wanted to go to library school. So, I applied, got in, and we both stopped working. I do not recommend this method. Someone in the family needs a real job.

However, I received a half scholarship and a paid internship. Later, I was offered a part time job at night in the school library as a student. My husband received a full scholarship including tuition and books; a job as a residential advisor that gave us an apartment in student housing, utilities, and a telephone.

My two jobs equaled 28 hours at minimum wage or less(a long story) and yet that was enough to buy us food and give up a little extra. We left school with a debt of $ 5000 after attending a well thought of university. The debt was from my education, not his. He knew how the system worked. Without his knowledge of these things, I cannot see how I could have ever stopped working long enough to complete this degree.

Someone said to me one time that, “no one doesn’t go to medical school because of the cost.” I suspect the same is true of almost anything. If you have a true desire to do something, just start and trust that life will work it out. If you work out one problem as they pop up instead of just looking off into the distance and deciding the trip is impossible, somehow you arrive at the destination asking yourself how that happened.