DES MOINES, Iowa — Last week Drake University announced that a new financial aid program in its first year is expanding in year two.

The Bulldog Promise program covers 100% of tuition for students that are eligible. The requirements include meeting Iowa residency standards, being a first-year student and being eligible for the Federal Pell Grant. The cumulative high school GPA requirement was set at 3.8, but now in the program’s expansion that is being lowered to 3.5.

“We’ve had a year to learn. We see that we want to expand it so as to capture more Iowa students,” said President Marty Martin of Drake University. “…We did look at what might have been the case had it been 3.5 last year. That would roughly double the population that would have been eligible. So we can forecast that maybe that yield doubles as well.”

President Martin said the financial implications of expanding the program fits in with the sustainable financial model.

There were 60 students who qualified at Drake this academic year. Some of those students had scholarships or grants from other avenues that already covered their tuition for all four years. That was another aspect of why the program will be expanded for the 2026-27 school year.

“I had a young woman stop me yesterday who’s a beneficiary of the Bulldog Promise and just was saying, ‘I never thought that we could possibly afford Drake.’ We have this perception, because we’re a private university, that we’re out of reach financially to many prospective students and their families. And really, that’s simply not true. They just take a good look, engage with us,” said President Martin. “We work so hard to find an affordable path for every student possible. And this Bulldog Promise is just a really, now, very prominent piece of that. But there are many other parts to it as well.”

One hundred percent of students at Drake University have some type of financial aid that is awarded to them, driving down the cost of attending the private institution. Applicants for the Bulldog Promise will also need to fill out the FAFSA form when it is available on October 1.