By Marlene Seeklander Schools that have not yet closed out their 2024-25 Direct Loan Program year need to make note of the upcoming closeout deadline. A March 18 Electronic Announcement reminds schools that Friday, July 31, 2026, is the closeout deadline and last processing day before the end of the program year. This means that all […]
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By Catherine Mueller Nearly 8 million student loan borrowers with $180 billion federal student loans are in default, according to the latest data from the Department of Education. The number of defaulted borrowers mirrors the count from December 2019, prior to the payment pause, when 7.7 million recipients with approximately $168 billion in federal student loans
Number of student loan borrowers in default matching pre-pandemic levels Read More »
By Marlene Seeklander More than 1800 higher education institutions across the country are at risk of losing access to federal student aid due to high rates of nonpayment by student loan borrowers. In a February 18 Electronic Announcement, the Department of Education released updated data indicating over 1800 institutions have nonpayment rates at or exceeding 25
Nonpayment rates among student loan borrowers put colleges and universities at risk Read More »
By Marlene Seeklander The Secretary of Education is seeking comments on proposed federal student loan regulatory changes, which stem from legislative action last summer. In a Federal Register Notice published on January 30, 2026, the Secretary proposes to amend some of the regulations governing the Federal student loan programs in order to implement changes that were
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By Marlene Seeklander Some nonprofit organizations could soon be excluded from the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program if it is determined the organization has a substantial illegal purpose. Although the final regulations were published October 31, 2025, the Department of Education just recently posted the information on the What’s New area of the Knowledge Center
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By Catherine Mueller Borrowers, who have defaulted on the federal student loans, received a temporary reprieve recently with a decision to delay collections activities. On January 16, the U.S. Department of Education (the Department) announced that it will delay the implementation of involuntary collections on federal student loans, including Administrative Wage Garnishment (AWG) and the Treasury
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By Marlene Seeklander Student loans are an investment in your future. When you apply for financial aid and receive a financial aid offer from the college financial aid office, you may be offered student loans. A student loan is money you borrow and must repay with interest. Student loans can come from a variety of sources:
Understanding student loans Read More »
By Catherine Mueller Despite the federal government shutdown, the Department of Education will resume negotiated rulemaking sessions on the student loan provisions which became law under budget reconciliation. Negotiators are expected to continue their discussions on the provisions November 3 to November 7. The first negotiated rulemaking session was conducted in early October and while many
By Marlene Seeklander The national student loan default rate remains at 0% for the third year in a row. The Department of Education (ED) released their FY 2022 national default briefing and, as expected, the FY 2022 cohort default rates were affected by the pause on federal student loan payments that began in March 2020.
FY 2022 national default rate briefing released Read More »
By Catherine Mueller Student loans have gotten a lot of press in the past few years and most of it has not been good. For some students, the headlines and stories are enough to scare them away from taking out any student loans – even it means not pursuing or postponing education beyond high school. And
The good and bad of student loans Read More »
