Student Loan Blog

An anonymous donor is playing secret Santa with at least a dozen colleges and universities nationwide, but instead of giving $5 trinkets this Santa has left schools with $1 million to $10 million gifts, The New York Times reports (“Anonymous Donor Gives Millions to Colleges,” April 24, 2009). Over the past two months the donor has given away ...

Weighed down by job losses, limited job availability, and lower salary wages, college graduates — who leave school owing an average of $22,500 in student loans — are defaulting on their federal student loans at the highest rate since 1998 (“In Grim Job Market, Student Loans Are a Costly Burden,” The New York Times, April 18, 2009). “When it ...

Despite New York’s $15 billion budget deficit, Gov. David Paterson announced he is creating a student loan program that would allow New York college students to borrow $350 million in low-cost private student loans directly from the state, reports The New York Times (“Governor to Unveil a Low-Cost Student Loan Program,” Dec. 15, 2008). State ...

In a move intended to avoid a shortfall in student loans next year, Congress has expanded the government program to buy federally guaranteed student loans from private lenders. Under the updated loan-purchase plan, the Education Department can now buy lenders’ student loans with origination dates between Oct. 1, 2003, and ...

Paying for college definitely isn’t getting any easier. “It just seems like it’s really hard, because it is,” says Diana Jacobs, a mother of twin, college seniors, whose husband recently lost his job, forcing the family to go from borrowing modestly to maxing out their student loan amounts (“In Downturn Families Strain to Pay Tuition,” The New ...

New York is one of the few states in the country where college students do not have access to a low-interest, state-backed student loan program, according to a report by the New York State Commission on Higher Education (“Final Report of Findings and Recommendations,” June, 2008).The report, the result of a year-long study conducted by a ...

Ohio governor, Ted Strickland, recently announced the implementation of The Ohio G.I. Promise, the first plan of its kind in the nation to extend in-state tuition rates to all veterans who attend an Ohio state public college or university on the GI Bill, according to an article in The New York Times (“Ohio Gives Veterans In-State Rates ...

A Harvard University education professor is challenging undergraduates at elite colleges to forgo high-paying consulting and finance jobs, for careers in public service. The professor, Howard Gardner, is leading seminars at Harvard and, Amherst College in Massachusetts, and Colby College in Maine, to encourage undergraduates to reflect more ...

The U.S. Department of State recently reinstated seven Fulbright Grants awarded to Palestinian students after withdrawing the awards when the students were denied permission to leave Gaza, according to an article in the Jerusalem Post (“State Tells Court It May Allow Study Abroad,” June 2, 2008). Israel has imposed a travel ban on all ...

Last week, Yale University president Richard Levin announced that the school will be increasing its undergraduate enrollment by 15 percent to 6,000 students, according to an article in The New York Times (“Yale to Expand Undergraduate Enrollment by 15 Percent,” June 9, 2008).Levin says Yale College, the school’s undergraduate program, will ...