Audience Analysis

Introduction

The purpose of a Student’s Guide to Funding their Education is to address the need for

student and family awareness on funding in higher education. This will be used to inform

students of different funding options, which will include, but is not limited to: loans,

scholarships, grants, and private donations. This guide will inform students of general college

financial aid policies. In addition to doing this, the guide will deliver the most effective ways to

be productive and effective while seeking funding options for higher education. This Student’s

Guide to Funding Your Education will serve as an educational tool for students (high school,

undergraduate, graduate, and post-graduate) to fund their education. With this guide, there will

be an increase in student awareness of financial aid options in higher education. The guide will

be designed to walk students through the general financial aid process, which begins at pre-

college preparation and is concluded at accepting financial aid.

Objective

This audience analysis will be used to identify the potential audience of the Students Guide to

Funding their Education. It is important to discover and recognize the needs of my audience.

My finding will allow me to be able to make a useful and significant technical report, that will be

constructively used by my readers. This audience analysis will allow me to be able to get a more

holistic perspective in relation to my readers. This will allow me to provide more relevant

information in my report, which will make it more personable and useful to my reader.

Document Summary

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This detailed analysis of my audience describes the variety of perspective audiences for my

report, as well as providing underlining information that is essential before the guide produced.

This audience analysis will go on to provide a more comprehensive view at the characteristics of

each audience type. The audiences that I will target are as follows:

• Pre-Collegiate students, seeking financial assistance.

• College students seeking aid to supplement their existing plan.

• Parents looking for financial aid options for their students.

Audience Types

The audience that I will attract will be broad, but all of them will have general interest in

financial aid for post-secondary institutions. This will include, but are not limited to: parents-

looking for financial aid options for their students, students looking for supplemental financial

aid, and pre-collegiate students looking to prepare for their futures. The audience may include

those who will never qualify for certain types of aid, but may still have interest in the general

function of federal aid. It can also be used as a resource for research with students who may

require statistics on general financial aid.

Background Knowledge

There is no specific type of prior knowledge required to understand the overall function of

financial aid. The Student’s Guide to Funding Their Education will provide information that can

be used by people from different levels of understanding; from high school freshman to college

post-graduate students. I will do this by approaching the subject matter as if my reader has no

previous experience with the topic, and is learning the information for the first time. I will be

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careful not to belittle my reader by over simplifying the information, but making simple and easy

explanations when needed.

Audience Break-down:

Taylor James: Freshman: Flint Southwestern Academy

Taylor James is a freshman at Flint Southwestern Academy, a local high school. Taylor

ultimately wants to become a medical doctor, but he knows that in order to do that he has to go

to college. Taylor falls into an awkward situation, as it relates to financing options for college.

Taylor’s parents make too much money for him t qualify for federal need based grants, and not

enough money to pay for his college education. Taylor has recognized this situation as an issue

and has decided to seek alternate options as it relates to funding college. He has descent grades,

fairly good writing skills, and has a strong will to find funding for college, in order to reac his

goal. Taylor does not know where to begin. Taylor has heard of pre-college programs and have

more recently found interest in them.

Maya Cooper: Sophomore: University of Michigan-Flint

Maya Cooper is completing her fourth semester of college. She has been taking out loans since

her first semester. After reviewing her finances, she has come to realize that she has accumulated

over twenty thousand dollars in student loans. Maya has maintained a strong overall GPA, and

she is now looking for options to reduce he total amount of debt and to gain more financial aid

for the future. She plans to complete her undergraduate degree, but she will have to drop out if

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she continues to accumulate debt at the rate that she is going in. She is now interest in grants,

scholarships, and private donations.

Vincent Alexander: Single parent of a high school senior

Vincent Alexander is a single parent of a high school senior attending Grand Blanc high school.

Vincent did not attend college, however he has done well for himself in the field of landscaping.

Vincent has never dealt with the college financial aid process and really does not know where to

begin. He started a small college fund for his daughter, but in the tough economic times, he has

had to take from it sporadically. The college fund still has enough money in it to cover tuition at

an in-state community college. Vincent just found out that his daughter was accepted to

Georgetown University, where tuition is at twenty thousand dollars per year. Mr. Alexander is

looking for ways to supplement the funds that he already has for his daughter’s education, so that

she can attend Georgetown University.

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