With just over a month before the start of the fall semester, college students and their parents have yet to learn the full impact of last month's slashing of two key Missouri scholarship programs.

All they know for sure is that they'll be getting a lot less this year from Access Missouri and Bright Flight — the first helps low- and middle-income students, while the second targets the state's top students. It has left many students worried about the future.

"It's just nerve-wracking," said Oakville's Sarah Tharp, who is about to start her sophomore year at Missouri State University. "I have to be down there on the 13th of August, and I still don't know what I'm getting."

The situation is starting to clear up, however, with details emerging Wednesday on the status of a $30 million scholarship fund offered by the state's student loan authority to help offset some of Gov. Jay Nixon's education cuts.

The money — characterized as a one-time grant — has been in a sort of limbo for the last month, with both the state and the Missouri Higher Education Loan Authority saying it was up to the other to decide how the money would be distributed.

But MOHELA's chief executive officer, Raymond Bayer Jr., said Wednesday that the money will be rolled into Access Missouri. The program was trimmed from $82 million to $32 million during last month's budget cuts. The loan authority is charged with increasing access to student lending for Missouri students. Last month, the authority announced it also had sufficient assets to pitch in $30 million for scholarships.

Even with the MOHELA money headed toward the beleaguered program, many students are expected to see their scholarships fall by $1,000 or more, creating uncertainty for students, many of whom have already paid deposits and fees to their schools. Many affected students will be able to find other sources of money, but there are some who are already are stretched to the limit, said Faith Sandler, executive director of the Scholarship Foundation of St. Louis.

"There is no extra $1,000 anywhere. They've tapped everything," Sandler said.

The prospect of declining awards has students like Carl Lewis II, of St. Louis, scrambling to make up the unexpected shortfall. Like many incoming freshmen, Lewis received a financial aid award letter in May — before the state gutted the Access Missouri fund. He was told to expect $1,500 from the need-based scholarship program as he prepares to pursue a chemical engineering degree at the University of Missouri-Columbia.

Like others, he is waiting to find out just how far off that estimate will be. "It's very frustrating. But I'm trying to be very optimistic about the whole situation," Lewis said.

Figuring out where those awards will fall is the job of the Department of Higher Education, which administers both scholarship programs.

Bright Flight awards — for students who score high on ACTs and SATs — are expected to be around $1,500, down from $2,000 last year, but the final amounts won't be known until the state receives a last round of test scores to determine how many students are eligible. Those results should be in by early August.

The bigger wild card is the Access Missouri program, which offers three award levels, based on whether a student is attending a two-year, four-year public or four-year private school. Higher education officials say they have been waiting both on the MOHELA decision and new estimates on the number of eligible students. That last factor alone is expected to dampen the awards, with 102,000 students eligible this year compared with 86,000 in 2009.

Last year, students at four-year public schools received as much as $1,680 through the program. That number is expected to fall to $1,000 or less. And while officials wait for those final budget numbers, they acknowledge the potential for the delays to force some students to consider sitting out a semester.

"I hope that's not the case. But with every day that goes by, that concern becomes more acute," said Leroy Wade, assistant commissioner for Department of Higher Education.

Financial aid directors at the University of Missouri campuses in St. Louis and Columbia don't see that happening.

Both schools have been telling upperclassmen for a month to prepare for a worst-case scenario with $500 scholarships from Access Missouri. That creates the potential "that our estimate will be low and students will be very surprised," said Jim Brooks, director of financial aid at the University of Missouri-Columbia.

Surprisingly, those award letters to upperclassmen haven't generated a lot of complaints — yet.

That could change soon, said Tony Georges, director of financial aid at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, which recently sent out its first round of bills, due Aug. 1.

"Make no mistake. When they sit down and start doing the arithmetic, they'll be calling," Georges said.