The chimera of student opposition to SAFRA
There have been some great pieces to come out this week about the political debate about Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act (SAFRA) on that vast series of tubes we call the worldwide web. SAFRA would eliminate a government program (Federal Family Education Loan Program – FFELP) that involves large, wasteful federal subsidies to student loan companies, and use the $87 billion in savings to raise Pell grants, improve access and completion rates, invest in minority serving institutions and historically black colleges and universities, and more.
It should come as no surprise that when Student Loan Analytics explored the topic of student opinion on SAFRA, they found many student newspapers in support of the legislation, and none opposed to it. In fact, when they searched Google for “students who support FFELP,” they got a very familiar message:
No results found for ”students who support FFELP”
And why should students support FFELP? As the same blog has pointed out before, FFELP offers students little to nothing in terms of choice, despite lender claims to the contrary. Billions in additional need-based grant funding for low and middle income students seems, obviously, more valuable to both students and taxpayers than preserving subsidies for lenders. (more…)
The Education Department’s (ED) Inspector General (IG)