United States Student Loan Legislation – 2012
Posted on | April 27, 2012
Due to economic hardship, many students with the desire to finish their college and professional degrees would seek out, different student loan programs given by the government or private sectors. It’s already a fact that a large number of students, ends up paying for their loans for 5, 10 or even 20 years or more. And so, the concern of assisting students with their dilemma made way for different government legislations to be passed. Some of the recent legislations like the Fairness for Struggling Students Act of 2011, which was introduced by Al Franken of Minnesota, Dick Durban of Illinois and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island and the Student Loan Bankruptcy Fairness Act of 2011 introduced by Representative Steve Cohen of Tennessee, George Miller of California, Danny Davis of Illinois and John Conyers of Michigan, were created to help seek roll back charges to private student loans.
Private student loans do not offer the same protection like federal loans have. The goal of most student loan legislation of 2012 is to put to a stop to the FFELP or Federal Family Education Loan Program which was started by the 1965 Higher Education Act. This act presented the idea, of college students getting their federally assured loans through a third party which are the private lenders. The objective of the student loan legislation of 2011 is to take off the role of third party lenders and give directly to college students their borrowed money, through the U.S. Department of Education. This will produce more money in savings for all the tax payers, for a very long period of time.
Some of the important benefits will be, more funds will become available for distribution to educational institutions, and investments will expand. This in turn will benefit programs like the Federal Pell Grant Program which assists low income students, by increasing their maximum annual limits. The nation’s community colleges will be given more funds for adult education and to strengthen their job training programs. Billions of money will be given to the minority serving institution to increase their graduate rates and school modernization. Additional finances will be also be given for the repair and renovation projects across the country.