Grants and Scholarships

Is financial aid and student grants going to stop?

Is it going to be harder to get?

Public Comments

1. i was thinking the same
2. Nobody is going to close all the schools.
3. There seems to be a strange amount of misinformation about this topic - I'm not sure where it's coming from, and nothing can be farther from the truth. The only recent change of any significance to the Federal Student Aid program was a passage that was included in the Health Care Reform Act that was passed by Congress, and signed by the President the other day. This change performs one of the campaign promises that Barack Obama made when he was running for office - it takes government lending out of the hands of the private banks, and makes the government, itself, the only source of government-backed student loans. From now on, instead of borrowing your Stafford Loan or PLUS Loan from a company like Sallie Mae, Citibank or Discover, your Stafford and PLUS loans will always come directly from the government. Under the old system, the government paid the private lenders a service fee for making Stafford and PLUS loans - by making the loans directly, the Department of Education will no longer need to pay those fees. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that this change will save $61 BILLION over the next 10 years - and the new process will take $51 Billion of that savings and put it right back into financial aid. That means MORE financial aid for all students, not less. Other changes in the bill also benefit students - when it comes time to repay your loan, the amount of your monthly payment will not be permitted to exceed 10% of your monthly income - rather than the 15% limit that is in place now. Also - borrowers who repay their loans on a income sensitive repayment plan will have the balance of their loan forgiven after 20 years of regular payments, rather than the 25 year period that currently applies. Student loans will be easier to apply for - and there will be MORE money available. The Pell Grant program will also benefit from the savings created by taking the government lending off the hands of the private lenders. If you need to verify this information, there are any number of news stories explaining the changes, including this one http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/03/26/1549576/student-loan-process-should-be.html and this one: http://thechoice.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/03/26/loans/ Good luck! I hope this helps.