Concerns About Access to Student Loans Persist, Study Finds
Some financial aid administrators have lingering concerns that students may not be able to get the
student loans they need to pay for college this year despite recently passed federal legislation designed
to improve students’ access to those loans, according to a recent survey.
The survey, released this week by the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators, showed that NASFAA
members who participated in the survey felt that the Ensuring Continued Access to Student Loans Act, HR 5715, may help to alleviate a
student loan shortage in the short-term but that a long-term solution is still needed.
More than half of the financial aid administrators who responded to the survey said they had been dropped
by at least one lender in the Federal Family Education Loan Program, even though that same lender is still offering
student loans to other institutions. Several lenders in the FFEL program announced last spring that they
would stop
offering student loans to colleges with high default rates, low loan volumes, or both — a practice
that 60 percent of the NASFAA members who responded to the survey say is discriminatory and should be
prohibited by Congress.
Survey participants were split over the issue of private student loans, which are not backed by the
federal government. About half said they thought students would have a more difficult time obtaining
private student loans this year but most agreed that the private student loan market has stabilized.
The survey, however, revealed that only a quarter of financial aid administrators have a backup plan in
place to handle any problems should the federal and private student loan markets face further
disruptions.
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