“College graduation is supposed to be synonymous with opportunity and prosperity and not a detour into a modern-day debtor’s prison.” – California Treasurer John Chiang College Is Expensive And Risky College is expensive, that is an undeniable, indisputable fact. To make things worse, student loans can be completely unaffordable and can have long term, crippling effects on your credit. In fact, it is estimated that students in America owe nearly $1.5 trillion in student debt. The average amount of debt carried by a graduate nationwide is about $28,000 dollars. In California, it is estimated that over half of college graduates carry some student debt. This session, California has seen a legislative push to make college more affordable and more accessible to prospective students. These include proposals to lower or freeze tuition, for free community college for a year, student loan transparency, and lower textbook costs. In addition, State Senator Ben Allen and Treasurer John Chiang…Read More
Federal Student Aid (FSA) is a governmental entity under the Department of Education that administers contracts and oversees companies that offer students loans to college students. When Obama was president, he had concerns that too many students were defaulting on their loans and the quality of service that collections agencies were providing to students. As a result, he authored three memos to FSA that required agencies to: Improve outreach efforts to students at risk of defaulting on their loans; Create a minimum standard of service that agencies have to provide to students; and Consider the possibility that agencies who provide poor service to students are penalized for providing poor service. That doesn’t sound too cumbersome, right? To require that collection agencies follow a minimum standard of service so that students have options before they default? After all, these agencies are more than happy to offer students ill-advised loans. The Trump administration apparently disagreed. On April…Read More
