More than 8,000 Fayette County

students have taken advantage of $38 million in HOPE Scholarships in the

10 years since the program was started, according to information released

this week by the Georgia Student Finance Commission.

And despite dire predictions

outstrip revenue generated by the Georgia Lottery, the state reported

this week that the games-of-chance raked in a record $2.6 billion over

the past 12 months an annual increase of 6 percent.

In hard dollars and cents,

that represents an increase in the available HOPE scholarship funds of

more than $25 million up from $726 million last year, state officials

said.

So for now, anyway, high school

students who work to meet the requirements for HOPE essentially, maintain

Georgia residency and earn a "B" grade point average upon graduation

still have the full benefits of the program to look forward to. To those

choosing to attend an in-state public college or university, it represents

full tuition and fees, plus $150 per semester book allowance.

Similar aid is given to students

who attend private schools or technical colleges, and even to students

who finished high school prior to 1993, when the scholarships were first

offered,

The program, the brainchild

of Sen. Zell Miller during his first term as governor, has been a huge

success, swelling the ranks of the state's universities and colleges to

record numbers. It has been held up as an example by state lottery commissions

around the country, and similar scholarship programs promised to voters

in South Carolina and Tennessee helped pass lottery referendums in those

states.

Among Fayette County students,

the past 10 years have seen 5,519 go on to HOPE-financed educations at

one of the state's four-year institutions, collectively earning $29 million.

Another 1,702 Fayette students

have taken advantage of the money to go to technical schools, qualifying

for $2.37 million in aid.

Among those Fayette County

students who chose to attend private, in-state colleges or universities,

1,170 of them were awarded $6.2 million in scholarship funds.

Statewide, a whopping 697,752

students enrolled through the HOPE program in Georgia colleges during

the past decade. The bottom line: $1.933 billion in tutition and fees

was paid in full, all of it earned through Georgia Lottery games.

Not surprisingly the state's

flagship university far outpaces all other four-year istitutions in the

state for HOPE receipients. Since 1993, the University Of Georgia in Athens

has welcomed 50,264 students on lottery money, an investment of more than

$348 million.

Georgia Tech's 15,991 HOPE

scholars have earned $99 million in 10 years, while nearby Clayton Collge

and State University in Morrow has welcomed 10,561 students who qualified

for $29 million in funds.

Trade school students, many

of them non-traditional college students, have benefited from the lottery

funds as well. Among the top schools in the state for HOPE students is

nearb y Griffin Technical College, which has seen 16,402 students receive

$19.5 million in 10 years.

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