Playmate of the Year Kennedy Summers -- She Needed the Money to Pay for School ... Really!

The new Playmate of the Year is like a unicorn -- a chick who really did get naked to help pay her way through school! Kennedy Summers is studying to be a plastic surgeon ... and no doubt the $100K prize will go a long way toward that.

But the other prize she got from Hef proves times are tough everywhere ... even at the Mansion.