Tying the knot: Student spouses discuss married life at Lehigh

Peter Phelps, ’15, met his wife, Tionni Phelps, ’15, in their freshman year dorm, McClintic-Marshall House. They were engaged by sophomore year, and married the week before junior year started.

The average national age of marriage is 28, according to the National Center for Educational Statistics. Married students represent a small percentage of the national collegiate student body, and out of 20,928 undergraduates surveyed by the National Center for Education Statistics in 2008, about 18 percent reported they were married.

“We purposely got married young because by college you are still in your formative years,” Peter Phelps said. “Everyone here is setting the course of their life, so getting married young means you are both setting the course of your life together and at the same time. This makes things a lot easier going forward rather than trying to reconcile two lives together when you are older.”

Peter and Tionni Phelps are not alone as a married couple at Lehigh.

Student athlete Austin Decker, ’16, is 24 and left school for two years after his sophomore year to serve a Mormon mission. He returned in May and got married to his wife, Jessica, who does not attend Lehigh, over this past winter break.

Despite being an undergraduate student, Decker and his wife currently reside in graduate student housing.

“Residential services was actually really helpful about finding a place to live,” Decker said.

Registered full-time graduate students and married undergraduate students are eligible for graduate student housing, according to Lehigh’s website.

According to the CNN article “Saying ‘I do’ while studying at the ‘U,’” “while there are various reasons why college sweethearts decide to tie the knot, one thing is for sure: Married students face more challenges than they did in the past.”

The article cited reasons such as the decreasing number of student loans available, married students having to take on more jobs to cover expenses and financial aid status changing as a result of marriage. These issues have caused more financial difficulties for some married students today than just five years ago.

“My financial aid did take a hit,” Peter Phelps said. “It is definitely something that Lehigh should work on. We were not satisfied because we talked to financial aid beforehand and they said that nothing would change.”

In order to determine eligibility for institutional aid, the university requires the CSS Profile, the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, the Lehigh Financial Aid application, and parent and student federal tax returns.

Lehigh uses two methodologies to determine financial need. One is the federal methodology, which uses the government application FAFSA. The other is the institutional methodology, which is determined by the CSS Profile.

Those who are currently married, as of today, are considered independent students for federal purposes only. However, it does not automatically make someone independent for institutional funds.

Institutionally, the university will dig a little bit deeper.

“If you say you are married, the first thing we will look at is your age and if you fall under the dependency age, which is 26, we would assume the student is still dependent of their parents even though they are married,” said Jennifer Mertz, the director of the Office of Financial Aid. “We will still ask for the parents’ information unless the student can show through their tax returns, income statements and bills that they are truly living independent of their parents.”

However, Mertz said that the university will try to determine if a student or students will be able to support themselves financially, regardless of age.

“We follow the same policies and procedures for every student,” Mertz said.

The questions that are asked on the FAFSA and the CSS profile are as of the day that the student files the application, so if a student gets married after they have submitted their application, it would not affect aid.

“Because my aid was already figured out before we got married, nothing was changed,” Decker said. “But next year, when we file our taxes together, it will change. Hopefully we won’t have any difficulties.”