Student Loan Blog : U.S. News & World Report

Number of Students With Unpaid Tuition Bills Growing

Student Loan Girl — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 23:24:00 GMT

Colleges and universities all across the country are seeing larger numbers of students who may soon be forced to drop out of college due to unpaid bills, according to a recent survey (“Unpaid College Tuition Bills Rise, Survey Finds,” U.S. News & World Report, Jan. 9, 2009).

The American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officer s found that of the 43 college registrars it surveyed, more than 65 percent said that they’d experienced an increase in unpaid bills over the previous year. At Spelman College in Atlanta, for example, nearly 25 percent of the student body — a record-breaking 500 students — is behind on their bills by an average of $3,000; nearly double the number of students who fell behind last year.

5 Things Cash-Strapped Students Can Do to Stay in School

In order to avoid being kicked out of college, students may take the following five steps to resolve their unpaid tuition bills:

Contact the registrar.
Some schools are willing to work with students to bring their accounts up to date. Schools may offer students an “emergency” loan, or give them the option of using a payment plan that allows a student to pay off the total amount they owe in small payments over a period of time.

Stop by the financial aid office.
There may be several school-sponsored scholarships available to students that schools didn’t offer before. To help students affected by the recession, some schools have raised additional funds to expand or create new financial aid programs, although aid may be limited.

Complete last year’s FAFSA.
Students who fill out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid could still retroactively receive college grants and low-cost loans that they would’ve qualified for last year. If nothing else, by filling out the FAFSA now, students may qualify for a federal student loan that could get help them get through the next semester.

File a “PJR”
If a student’s or a family’s financial circumstances have changed, such as a job or income loss, a student may request a PJR, a “professional judgment review,” from their financial aid office. During a PJR, the financial aid office may determine that a student needs more funds for college and could award them emergency or other aid.

Try peer-to-peer lending.
Once all other options are exhausted, students may want to explore borrowing money from extended family members, friends, or even strangers through social lending sites like GreenNote or LendingClub. But students should read the fine print on any loan documents to ensure they understand their rates and terms before borrowing.

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NextStudent to Be Spotlighted at Largest Virtual College Fair

Student Loan Girl — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 16:06:00 GMT

Don Fenstermaker, the founder and CEO of NextStudent, will join noted names Mark Kantrowitz, publisher of FinAid.org, and Kim Clark, senior writer for U.S. World & News Report, as one of only a few financial aid experts to give a live streaming video keynote presentation on college financing at today’s CollegeWeekLive event.

CollegeWeekLive, the largest virtual college fair on the Web, is hosting its “Paying for College” event today as a free online resource for students and parents looking for information on college financing and the financial aid process.

Fenstermaker’s presentation, “Paying for College A–Z,” will be streamed live from his NextStudent office in Phoenix, Ariz., and NextStudent’s professional Education Finance Advisors will be on-hand to interact directly with students and parents, discussing their college financing options, answering questions about parent and student loans, and offering guidance on where to find the financial resources that can help families cover all their college costs.

CollegeWeekLive participants are also invited to visit NextStudent’s virtual booths and watch spotlight video presentations on the company’s free online scholarship database, its flagship private student loan program, and its popular NextPath blogs for students, graduates, and parents.

From any NextStudent booth, attendees can connect directly to the NextStudent website, chat live with a NextStudent Education Finance Advisor, search over $16 billion in available scholarships, and apply free for a private student loan.

The fair kicks off at 10 a.m. Eastern today and runs until 8 p.m. Admission is free, and students and parents can still register online through the CollegeWeekLive website.

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New SAT Policy Gives Students Control Over What Scores Colleges See

Student Loan Girl — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 00:32:00 GMT

A new SAT scoring policy will give high school students the option to show only their best SAT score to college admissions officers and to prevent these school officials from seeing test-scores that were less-than-stellar.

Under the new policy, which goes into effect next year, students can take the widely used college entrance exam multiple times and send only the scores they want admissions officers to see, unlike the current policy in which colleges receive scores every time a student attempted the SAT.

The score-reporting change recently announced by the College Board, the nonprofit organization that administers the test, comes at a time when universities are placing less emphasis on standardized testing in choosing prospective freshmen and when the rival ACT exam is gaining popularity, according to the LA Times (“SAT Will Let Students Pick Which Scores to Show Colleges,” June 21, 2008). The new SAT scoring option emulates the ACT’s long-standing score-choice policy.

“It’s clearly a marketing move to try to fend off the growing perception that the ACT is a more consumer-friendly product,” says Robert Schaeffer, public education director of FairTest, an organization that monitors standardized tests for signs of bias (“Kids Can Pick Which SAT Scores a College Sees,” U.S. News World Report, June 24, 2008).

Changes Giving Affluent Students a Boost, Critics Say

Some high school counselors and college admissions officials have raised concerns that the SAT score-reporting change will give students who can afford to retake the $45-test multiple times an edge, writes U.S. News reporter Lucia Graves. But College Board officials say the criticisms are unfounded, contending that “there’s no advantage to taking the SAT more than twice, and our fee waivers let low-income students take the test [free] twice.”

The SAT’s score-reporting change is the latest shake-up to the standardized test that has been a college admission staple for decades. Just last week, the College Board announced that despite dramatic changes to the SAT that were designed to help colleges and universities better predict a student’s academic performance in college, the adjustments did not improve the overall reliability of the test.

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Word to the Wise on New Loan Forgiveness Programs: You May Not Qualify

Student Loan Girl — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 22:56:00 GMT

College students looking to relieve their federal student loan debt “will be sorely disappointed” with the government’s new loan forgiveness programs that will begin in 2009, according to an article in U.S. News & World Report (“The Problem with Federal Loan Forgiveness Programs,” May 28, 2008).

Under the public-service loan forgiveness program, students must make payments on their student loans for 10 years before the loans can be forgiven, said Diane Auer Jones, assistant secretary for postsecondary education, at the College Savings Foundation conference last month. Since a majority of federal student loans have a 10-year term, there may be no loan balance left to be forgiven.

In addition, the Department of Education is concerned that "some students will see the program and take on more debt than they would have otherwise, not realizing it is unlikely that most of their loans will be forgiven," Jones commented.

The public-service loan forgiveness program grants $4,000 in “Teach grants” to students studying to be teachers in “high need” classrooms. But teachers who accept the grants and do not end up working in needy schools, will see those grants turn into loans that have to be repaid. Based on the outcome of similar government programs, up to 80 percent of grant recipients ended up having to repay their grant-turned-loan with interest, U.S. News reports.

Robert Shireman, director of the Project on Student Debt, suggests instead that students consolidate their loans under the federal government’s new Income-based Repayment option. The program allows low-pay service workers to make reasonable monthly payments based on their income level and to have the balance of the loan forgiven after 120 payments.

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Top-Rated Colleges Drop SAT Requirement for Admissions Applicants

Student Loan Girl — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 23:27:00 GMT

Smith College in Massachusetts and Wake Forest University in North Carolina recently joined the nearly 30 percent of all 760 four-year colleges and universities in the country that no longer require the submission of SAT or other standardized test scores as a condition for admission, according to an article on CNN.com (“More Colleges Move Toward Optional SATs,” May 30, 2008).

Although many other institutions have previously gone SAT and ACT-optional, Smith and Wake Forest are the first top-30 schools on U.S. News & World Report’s Top Liberal Arts Colleges list and Top National Universities list, respectively, to drop the requirement. Smith College ranked 17^th on 2008’s top liberal arts colleges list and Wake Forest came in 30^th out of the nation’s top universities.

"We in admissions have put up a barrier to these students to say all of your hard work and all of your academic achievement is being negated by one test, and we don't feel like that is fair," said Martha Allman, Wake Forest’s director of admissions, in the Chicago Tribune (“University to Drop Required ACT, SAT,” May 27, 2008).

Under the new policy, Wake Forest will still allow applicants to submit SAT and ACT scores if they choose, but will start placing more emphasis on personal interviews, academics, and extracurricular activities.

College consultant Jack Maguire, founder of Maguire Associates, believes that schools which become test-optional, like Wake Forest, focus their admissions decisions on what’s really important.

"I do think it improves a school's image," he said. "It shows… they're really interested in increasing diversity."

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Availability of Federal Perkins Student Loans Is Dwindling

Student Loan Girl — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 09:28:00 GMT

A growing shortage of funds in the federal Perkins student loan program could affect as many as 50,000 students in the upcoming academic year, according to a recent article in U.S. News & World Report.

Students who would have been eligible to receive a low-cost Perkins loan last year may not be offered one this year due to the limited availability of funds.

And the students who do manage to get a Perkins loan will likely see the size of their award shrink, writes U.S. News reporter Kim Clark (“Why Perkins Loans Are Harder to Get This Year,” March 25, 2008).

Schools Struggle to Replenish Limited Perkins Funding

Federal Perkins loans, which carry a fixed interest rate of 5 percent and are subsidized by the federal government, are reserved for undergraduate and graduate students who are considered to be “exceptionally needy.”

Financial aid officials at the nation’s colleges and universities are attributing the scarcity of Perkins loans to a combination of factors: the failure of federal funding for the Perkins program to keep pace with what has been a steady increase in college enrollment, and Perkins borrowers who are taking longer to repay their loans.

Schools are each assigned a fixed pool of Perkins funds from which to lend. Unlike other federal college loans, which are paid back directly to the government or to lenders in the federal education loan program, Perkins funds are payable to the school, with schools dependent on that repayment money to generate new Perkins loans for incoming and returning students.

The longer alumni take to repay their Perkins loans, the less money is immediately available to current students eligible for these loans.

Many Perkins borrowers, faced with rising interest rates over the last few years on everything from private student loans and federal consolidation loans to credit cards and home loans, have focused on repaying their higher-interest student loans and other debt, steering away from paying off their Perkins loan early and opting instead to take the full 10-year Perkins repayment term.

Adding to the problem, says Rick Shipman, director of Michigan State University’s financial aid office, is the fact that some students are able to discharge their Perkins loan if they go into the military or teaching.

“Their debts are forgiven by the federal government but the federal government doesn’t necessarily reimburse the school,” explains Shipman (“Credit Crunch Alarms Student Loan Lenders,” MSU State News, March 26, 2008).

Colleges and Universities Scaling Back on Perkins Awards

With less Perkins repayment money coming in and no government funds being added to expand the federal Perkins pool, schools are being forced to scale back their Perkins awards.

At Ohio University, Perkins funding is so limited, Clark writes, that officials anticipate a 12 percent decline in the number of Perkins student loans the school will be able to issue this fall.

Also expecting to make cuts to its Perkins student loans is the University of Maryland at College Park, which has seen its Perkins funding shrink this year to just half of the $2.3 million it had available last year.

At Michigan State University, where the Perkins pool has dropped from $7 million to $5 million in the last year alone, financial aid officials plan to eliminate over 2,000 Perkins awards in the fall and cut the average award from $1,200 to $1,000.

MSU expects to award about 4,400 Perkins loans to undergraduates in the upcoming academic year, down from the 6,600 it issued in 2007–08. The school already eliminated Perkins loans for its graduate students last year.

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Student-Ranked Top Colleges and Other Tools to Help You Find the Right Fit

Student Loan Girl — Thu, 22 Nov 2007 20:38:00 GMT

If you’re in high school and looking ahead to college, you probably already know all about U.S. News & World Report’s annual “America’s Best Colleges,” which ranks colleges and universities around the country. These rankings can give you a great place to start, but if your college search revolves entirely around this list, you’re throwing yourself at the mercy of only one corporation’s definition of “best.”

The “best” school for a potential geneticist may have a stellar biosciences faculty but no intramural sports—if you’re an aspiring genetic engineer who unwinds with regular competitive basketball games, you might want to ask yourself if you would be happy there for four or more years.

If rankings are important to you in making your college decision, consider expanding your search to include other “best” lists that go beyond just academics, that might be able to give you a sense of the campus, the town, the personality of the students, and of whether or not you’ll fit in and enjoy your life there.

The Princeton Review Best Colleges: Students Rate Their Own Campuses

Find out what current students think about their own schools and get various bests (and worsts) for every personality type with The Princeton Review’s Best 366 Colleges. The 2008 edition of The Princeton Review’s annual rankings surveys more than 120,000 students on 366 campuses.

You won’t find any “top schools” overall here. As The Princeton Review explains in one of their answers to an FAQ, “We don’t believe that any one school is the best overall. … Some colleges in our book may be ideal for some students but wrong for others, depending on their interests and needs.”

Instead, the survey results serve up the top 20 schools in each of 62 categories like:

Best Campus Food: Virginia Tech (Blacksburg, VA)
Is It Food?: U.S. Merchant Marine Academy (Kings Point, NY)
Dorms Like Palaces: Smith College (Northampton, MA)
Dorms Like Dungeons: U.S. Coast Guard Academy (New London, CT)
Best Classroom Experience: Reed College (Portland, OR)
Most Long Lines and Red Tape: Tuskegee University (Tuskegee, AL)
Biggest Frat & Sorority Scene: DePauw University (Greencastle, IN)
Students Most Nostalgic for Ronald Reagan: Warren Wilson College (Asheville, NC)
Students Most Nostalgic for Bill Clinton: Thomas Aquinas College (Santa Paula, CA)
Most Diverse Student Body: Temple University (Philadelphia)
Most Birkenstock-Wearing, Tree-Hugging, Clove-Smoking Vegetarians: Hampshire College (Amherst, MA)
Best College Radio Station: St. Bonaventure University (St. Bonaventure, NY)
Where Intercollegiate Sports Are Unpopular or Nonexistent: New College of Florida (Sarasota, FL)
Where Students Pack the Stadiums: University of Maryland (College Park, MD)

You can find the complete Princeton Review student rankings free online, or buy a copy of the book (list price $21.95). In addition to the rankings and two-page profiles on each of the 366 schools, the book version has a new section with lists of “Great Colleges for 15 of the Most Popular College Majors.”

Other Online Resources and Rankings

For more student rankings and other “best” categories, check out these sites:

Campus Dirt’s Top Ten Lists: Toughest Classes, Easiest Freshman Parking, Most “Wired” Campus, Most Options for Late-Night Food, Where Lectures Are Related to the “Real World,” …
Students Review: University & College Rankings: Top Engineering Schools, Top Schools for Smart People, Top Creative Schools, Top Ivies, Biggest Reputation, …
College Rankings by College Prowler: Grades schools A through F on things like parking, nightlife, weather, guys, girls, campus strictness, and local atmosphere
The Templeton Guide to Colleges That Encourage Character Development: 405 exemplary programs in 10 categories like Volunteer Service, Academic Honesty, Spiritual Growth, and Civic Education

First-Hand Accounts and Campus Tours

Besides doing your reading and online research, ask around. Your friends may know former students who can give you a first-hand opinion of the school you’re interested in.

One of the best ways to get a feel for a campus and the student life is to visit. If you can’t afford the travel costs to check out the campus for yourself, try a virtual campus visit at CampusTours.com or College-Visits.com to get a better feel for what your college life might actually be like once you’re on campus.

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America’s “Best” Colleges of 2008: Strategies for College-Bound Students to Compose Their Own List

Student Loan Girl — Thu, 23 Aug 2007 16:00:00 GMT

Once again, U.S. News & World Report’s latest ranking of colleges and universities received hordes of criticism and its yearly flogging from university presidents and officials who take issue with the magazine’s grading system. Even despite the effort of a small group of college presidents to initiate a boycott of the magazine’s survey, school participation only diminished by seven percent this year.

Touted as having the most sought-after lists of academic rankings, U.S. News compiles 25 percent (the largest portion) of its survey from college officials’ ratings of their fellow institutions. The legitimacy of these rankings, particularly those of colleges and universities, comes under fire every year, with some administrators arguing that the ranking methods lead to distorted or spurious evaluations among competing schools attempting to vault themselves up in the standings.

As more and more students graduate high school with their eyes set on higher education, the notion of what makes a college the “best” or the “right” school for a larger and increasingly diverse pool of applicants becomes all the more complicated.

While the U.S. News listings carry a certain authority after having been around for 24 years, rank-watchers should bear in mind that the rating methodology only accounts for a few, measurable dimensions of college “quality.” There are plenty of intangibles that go into defining a total college experience, and parents and students should consider expanding the criteria for their search beyond just a ranking to get at what the numbers in a magazine can’t tell you.

· First-hand accounts. Your parents and siblings are probably more than willing to talk about their alma mater, so sit them down to get the inside scoop. Use your Facebook and MySpace time to scour groups and photos from the schools on your list and to chat with current students about their school’s programs and social activities.

· See for yourself. If you can, visit the schools on your list. Those pretty pictures on the brochure won’t give you the feel of what the midday rush is like on the quad. Explore on your own in addition to guided tours, to get a sense of the general vibe of the campus and surrounding areas. Pick up a copy of the college newspaper or check it out online. Read what other students are reading, writing, debating and thinking, and ask yourself—would you fit in here?

· No one school is good at everything. Top-50 NYU is a terrific choice if you’re an aspiring actor that wants in to their nationally renowned Tisch School of the Arts. But if you see yourself joining the Peace Corps or traveling all over the world as a service volunteer, your perfect path may be the Pre-Peace Corps, International, and Non-Governmental Service concentration offered at Tier 3 Warren Wilson College in Asheville, N.C.

If you’re interested in a particular major or career track, you can search schools by field of study at Petersons.com. Browse school websites to get a feel for how certain departments operate, what kinds of classes are offered, and contact professors within the department to see what kind of research is being done.

Other Sources of Information

The U.S. News rankings provide a decent starting point for getting a general idea of how big-name schools compare in certain areas, but they don’t offer in-depth information or the insider’s view that would give you an idea of what day-to-day life is like on campus.

Sites like CollegeBoard.com let you search schools by location, major and cost, just to name a few, and they offer tips for planning your college career and preparing for admissions. These sites are easy to navigate and will allow you to compare your schools across specific categories..

For your parents, we recommend The Thinking Parent’s Guide to College Admissions: The Step-by-Step Program to Get Kids Into the Schools of Their Dreams.

Talk to the education finance advisors at NextStudent. They have all the information and advice you need on student loans. Check out www.nextstudent.com.

Student Loan Girl

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Fake Data From U.S. News & World Report’s College Rankings?

Student Loan Girl — Thu, 15 Mar 2007 15:25:00 GMT

In the past few years, there has been a lot of controversy surrounding U.S. News & World Report’s yearly college issue, “America’s Best Colleges” and the rankings of the colleges. Many are saying the rankings and the methodology used are inaccurate at best and slanted at worst. I remember a New York Times article saying that the rankings may be based more on endowments, as Harvard, Yale and Princeton tend to end up in the top three slots and also have the largest endowments.

Today I came across an article by Scott Jaschik titled “Would U.S. News Make Up Fake Data?” found in the March 12, 2007 edition of Inside Higher Ed. Apparently, colleges are starting to take a stand by speaking out against U.S. News & World Report’s methods. According to the article, “It’s not unusual for college presidents to complain about U.S. News rankings (at least out of the earshot of U.S. News editors). But on Sunday, the president of Sarah Lawrence College publicly charged that the magazine is preparing to publish made up, false data about her institution.”

Controversy Stems from Assumptions

What is going on here is that since Sarah Lawrence College “no longer collects or examines SAT scores, U.S. News officials have said that the magazine will just assume that the average SAT would have been one standard deviation (about 200 points) below the average of Sarah’s Lawrence’s peers. ‘In other words, in the absence of real data, they will make up a number,’ wrote [Michele Tolela] Myers,” as stated in the article. Myers is president at Sarah Lawrence. Many college administrators claim that the magazine unfairly penalizes schools that do not submit such data as “reputational” surveys and SAT scores, as is the case with Sarah Lawrence.

The article stated that “Bob Schaeffer, public education director of the National Center for Fair & Open Testing, praised Sarah Lawrence and said it was taking a principled stand. ‘The U.S. News policy of fabricating data for colleges which refuse to report average scores it is both unfair and unethical,’ he said, adding that the ‘practice further undermines the credibility of the magazine’s already widely criticized rankings.’”

Organized Effort to Combat ‘Ranksteering’

On the heels of Myer’s stand is one by several colleges to band together and defend “educational values” over misleading and unfair rankings. The article reported:

“A new effort is being organized to allow colleges to act in concert so that they fight back against the rankings. Some of the inspiration for this new effort came in January, when Lloyd Thacker, founder of the Education Conservancy, gave a presentation to the Council on Independent Colleges called ‘Ranksteering: Driving Under the Influence.’ Thacker’s organization argues that the college admission process has become divorced from educational values and ‘ranksteering’ is his term for the impact of U.S. News and other rankings.

“The presentation prompted a group of 10 presidents to work on a letter — currently circulating among them — outlining strategies that could be used to take on the rankings. The presidents’ idea is to send the letter to all Council on Independent Colleges members (more than 570 institutions) to try to build a movement with the clout to be effective. Among the ideas in the letter: refusing to provide any help to U.S. News, refusing to fill out the ‘reputational’ survey, pledging not to advertise any rankings they receive from U.S. News, and/or posting a prominent statement on their Web sites noting the dubious qualities of many ratings.”

I always wondered just how fair these rankings are, and now it seems the truth is coming out. Hopefully, this initiative started by the 10 college presidents will go far in encouraging college students to do their own due diligence when researching college options, instead of relying on a potentially flawed ranking system.

Talk to the education financial advisors at NextStudent. They have all the information and advice you need on student loans. Check out www.nextstudent.com.

Be sure to tune in next Tuesday for my next blog about this week in student loans.

Student Loan Girl

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U.S News Rankings Affect State College Funding?

Student Loan Girl — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 16:37:00 GMT

It goes without saying that the media tend to influence public opinion, if not in large part shape it.

A case in point is the ranking of colleges in U.S. News & World Report. According to a March 2, 2007 article by Elia Powers titled “A U.S. News Effect on College Funding?” that appeared in Inside Higher Ed, “College rankings, such as those published annually by U.S. News & World Report, are typically thought to factor into a consumer’s perception of an institution. Plenty has been written about how high school students, parents and college counselors respond to the list. But what about state legislatures?”

Study Finds Interesting Correlations

In my mind, this is a particularly relevant line of questioning. As I have said in previous posts, I am having a difficult time believing that the new student loan legislation (Student Relief Act [H.R. 5], Sunshine Act, STAR Act and others) will save or benefit college students as much as we have been told. I have just dug too deeply and read too much to the contrary to think otherwise. So, my idea was that perhaps the low-income students could best be helped by instituting policy or legislation at the state level that would generate the funds they need for attending school.

The article outlined the findings of this study which correlated rankings in the publication with an increase in state funding. Here is what it said:

“In 1987, state funding was higher for colleges that had regularly been in the top 25 (the University of California at Berkeley, for instance) than for those that had not. That trend line continued in 1995. The researchers found that state funding increased an average of 58 percent from 1987 to 1995 for colleges that first appeared in the rankings in 1990. By comparison, state funding increased 49 percent for colleges that were never ranked and 48 percent for those already on the list.

“The report says that the increase in state expenditures amounted to 6.5 percent per student, while the U.S. News exposure did not seem to have an impact on the institutions’ tuition rates. States with the largest pre-college age population, voter turnout and U.S. News newsstand sales were most likely to see the greatest rise in state appropriations, according to the paper.

“‘The idea is that you have this information out there that is read by the whole public,’ said one of the paper’s co-authors, Ginger Zhe Jin, an assistant professor of economics at the University of Maryland at College Park. ‘What we see in the data is that states where people are more actively looking at the rankings are the ones where the funding increase follows.’”

Solution to Funding Ailments Suggested by Study

Again, the article suggests that the U.S. News & World Report publication perhaps has an effect on college funding at the state level. And my thought is, how could we use that to our advantage, to really do something for college students who need it, like low-income attendees? In other words, is there some way we could use local, state and/or national media channels to influence the state legislatures in a similar manner, so that lower-income students get the money they need for college? While I certainly do not have the exact answer, I think it is an intriguing idea that deserves further exploration.

Talk to the education financial advisors at NextStudent. They have all the information and advice you need on student loans. Check out www.nextstudent.com.

Be sure to tune in next Tuesday for my next blog about this week in student loans.

Student Loan Girl

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