Bartending School Loans
Education Loans Remain Largely Elusive: Your Options
Trade school, career loans and continuing education loans have become much more commonplace. Cosmetology, truck driving and even welding schools have forged lucrative alliances with student loan providers and now most offer career or trade school loans for interested students.
Bartending schools remain outside the realm of student loans. Here are your best bets for financing a bartending program.
Popular Way to Pay for Bartending School: Credit and Payment Plans
Credit cards can get you into serious trouble, no doubt, but if you have a line of credit without a very high interest rate, you might opt to pay for your weeklong bartending program with plastic.
Better yet, many bartending schools offer a payment plan. Yes, you’ll likely be subject to a credit check, but the programs are nothing like a major purchase, instead expect to put out between $250 and $1,000 for a good bartending course.
**Tip: Shop for bartending schools that offer incentive discounts when you register.
- ABC Bartending Schools are located in all the major cities. This school has been in business for 30 years. While you may not take out a student loan directly with the school, you certainly may qualify for their payment plan.
- Boston Bartenders School charges $395 for a 40-hour course, but they offer a $150 discount if you register online.
Best Chance for Bartending Student Loans
Here are some examples of bartending programs that feature traditional and private student loans.
Find traditional student loans for bartending programs: shop carefully among technical and trade schools for certificate programs. You may qualify for financial aid when you decide to study bartending through programs like these.
Sallie Mae Career Training Loan: Where Can You Find One for Bartending?
Sallie Mae (SLM), THE name in student loans, offers a Career Training Loan. This is a private, credit-based loan, but is specially designed to fill the gap where traditional student loans fail. Guess what? There are quite a number of culinary schools that affiliate with SLM in order to offer this type of finance. What does this mean for you?
Here’s astrategy for finding a bartending program that also may allow you the flexibility to use the Career Training Loan: locate a culinary school that is affiliated with SLM that also includes a bartending or sommelier program as part of its curriculum.
**Example: National Culinary and Bakery School in California is approved to extend the SLM Career Training Loan for its bartending program.
Traditional Student Loans
Crescent Schools of Gaming and Bartending, with locations in both Mississippi and Louisiana, offer a 45-hour bartending course or a 12-week Beverage Management program. Both tracks are designed to get you off the ground in the hospitality and gaming field ASAP. Crescent provides financial aid options that include federal student loans and Pell Grants depending on your educational and career goals and provided you qualify.
The Culinary Institute of Charleston, through Trident Tech, in South Carolina, includes a Mixology Certificate program, along with an advanced study in Viticulture, prelude to a Sommelier licensure. The Institute provides student loans through the South Carolina Student Loan Corporation. Mixology candidates may be eligible for a state-based student loan—the Palmetto Assistance Loan.
When All Else Fails—Personal Loans Cover Bartending School
When you are not able to score a true career loan for a bartending program, you may always consult with your private lender for a personal loan. For example, Wachovia offers a Miscellaneous Secured Loan. Designed for almost any sundry expense you may need to cover, this product may be the answer to a short-term bartending program that typically runs under a thousand bucks.
For Less Than the Price of...
One very affordable option is to check out University Bartending courses. This gig delivers Basic and Pro weekend crash bartending courses for college students in about a dozen cities. What’s best about it is the price: the pro course will run you under $250, probably less than what you’d spend for a couple of big nights out drinking and dining with your friends.
There are literally hundreds of bartending schools, bartending and mixology programs across the U.S. Some are standalone institutions, while others are part of a technical or culinary school’s larger curriculum.
