Introduced this year, "How America Pays for Graduate School" is a national study by Sallie Mae, conducted by Ipsos. This new study is designed to complement Sallie Mae's "How America Pays for College" report, which, for the last 10 years, has provided insights into how American families plan and pay for college, with a focus on the undergraduate experience. How America Pays for Graduate School surveyed 1,597 graduate students ages 20 and older online about how much they spent on graduate school and the resources they used to fund their education. The study also asked grad students about their reasons for earning a graduate degree, and the considerations they weighed when making decisions about attending. The study examines all resources graduate students use to pay for school. This includes conventional resources, such as savings, scholarships, grants, and student loans, as well as less frequently used resources, such as contributions from relatives and friends, credit cards, other sources of credit, and retirement funds. The study also explores the motivations and attitudes behind grad students' decisions to invest time and money to earn a graduate-level degree.