The four sites where the bulk of staff are being hired are Newark, DE (new credit and collections center), Fishers, IN (technnology center) and Newton, MA (UPromise): 

———————————
As for the departments hiring, IT represented almost 1/3 of the recs., with collections a distant second at 13%.  Many of the jobs that had no department listed were credit/collections jobs available in Newark so the number of collections recs. are likely very close to their information technology. 

View full post on Student Lending Analytics Blog

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Seven-eighths of students who applied for federal aid using the Free
Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) had an average loan debt of
$24,651. Assuming a standard 10-year repayment at 6.8 percent, those
students would pay roughly $9,400 in interest. If we really want to
save students money, why not just reduce the interest rate by 1.5
percentage points, to 5.3 percent, saving students $2,240 in interest?

If this Washington takeover happens, I propose that all 19
million-plus student loans made by the government carry this warning
label:

"Beware: Your federal government is overcharging you so your
representative can take credit for starting new government programs.
Enjoy the extra hours you work to pay off your student loan."

View full post on Student Lending Analytics Blog

• Turn back the murktide:  New online financial literacy game I Gen Revolution launched:  "The Council for Economic Education (CEE), a leading not-for-profit
  advocate and service provider in the field of K-12 economic education,
  launched today Gen i Revolution, an online game developed to teach
  personal finance skills to middle and high school students.
  The competitive online game includes 15 Missions in which students
  complete a variety of activities to beat back the insidious "Murktide"
  infestation. The "Murktide," a confusion about basic personal finance
  principles, is rapidly spreading across the population, and middle and
  high school students are the last line of defense against a lifetime of
  poor financial decisions."

• Wisconsin high school developing virtual financial literacy class:  "While the school has been active in teaching financial literacy in the
  classroom, Weber is pushing for a virtual finance class with the help
  of Altra Federal Credit Union. The virtual finance course will use a
  combination of 3-D virtual simulation and the integration of real-world
  products.  Amy McCutchin, a student teacher working with Weber’s
  classes, said each student will get a personal avatar and be able to
  simulate on the computer anything they would do in the real world.

  “It’s
  a safe environment,” McCutchin said. “They can make mistakes now rather
  than later. It’s the first course of its kind in the country.” Students
  will be exposed to a trial run of the program in April.  Teachers
  and students will be able to track students’ decisions and the impact
  of those decisions. As students navigate through the program, they gain
  financial knowledge and recognize the better choices, which will
  hopefully carry over into real life behaviors.

• Idaho State Board of Education selects RealityWorks software and curriculum to help schools satisfy graduation requirement:  "The Idaho Department of Education has adopted the TimeMAPS Money Management & Life Skills Program
  from Realityworks, Inc., as a resource in the Professional-Technical
  Education/Family Consumer Science classification for grades 9-12. The
  financial literacy software and curriculum was approved to help
  districts ensure students meet graduation requirements, and the
  requirements of the Idaho State Standards."
  • RealityWorks also had a recent win in Texas.  

• Didn't take too long for someone to find this loophole in the new credit card legislation (from Smart Money):  "The CARD Act prohibits credit-card issuers
  from giving out free stuff to students in exchange for filling out a
  credit-card application on college campuses, at college-sponsored
  events, or within 1,000 feet of them.  But
  it leaves a huge loophole: Card issuers can still give out freebies as
  long as they don’t require students to sign up for a credit card. That
  means that credit-card companies can still hawk free stuff on campus
  for promotion, says Susswein."

• Felix Salmon's opinion on where the Consumer Financial Protection should NOT be housed and the value of financial literacy programs put out by banks:  "Essentially, the CFPA, by its nature, is going to have to have an adversarial relationship with the banking industry, at least at the outset. The prudential regulators, meanwhile, exist to make those banks healthier: they like
  anything which generates income and profits, and have historically not
  cared in the slightest if such products are only profitable because
  they rip off consumers with moderate financial literacy. If they end up
  housing the CFPA, the CFPA will never be allowed to force the banks into the world of simplicity and honesty that we financial consumers so desperately need."

• Budding Alex P. Keaton's (Family Ties reference) will have a chance to shine at this Money Bee event in Buffalo: "The University at Buffalo School of Management and M&T Bank will
  host more than 80 students from 16 public, private and charter schools
  in the third annual "MoneySKILL® Mania," a financial literacy competition for high school juniors and seniors…The goal of the event is to increase awareness of MoneySKILL, a free,
  interactive Internet curriculum designed to educate students to make
  informed financial decisions on a variety of personal finance issues, including income, money management, credit, saving and investing."
  • Here is link to MoneySkill

• How would fare in completing an essay on this topic? (from student looking for help) "Imagine your parent(s) just inherited $100,000 from a long lost aunt.
  Explain to them why it’s important to invest their money so that it
  grows over time for retirement. Also, explain why it’s important to
  diversify their investments among stocks, bonds and mutual funds, which
  are called asset classes. Choose two investments from among the stock,
  bond, and mutual fund asset classes that you would recommend for the
  long-term. (For example, choose a stock and a mutual fund, a stock and
  a bond, or a bond and a mutual fund.) Explain why you would choose each
  one. Also, explain why you think your choices would be good investments
  for their retirement."

View full post on Student Lending Analytics Blog

• 48 percent said that they felt like "just another face in the crowd" in dealing with their guidance counselors.
• 67 percent said that they would rank their counselors as fair or poor in helping them find an appropriate college.
• 62 percent said that they would rank their counselors as fair or poor in helping them find ways to pay for college.
• 60 percent gave their counselors fair or poor rankings on thinking about different career paths.

Here were the four findings listed on Public Agenda website:

View full post on Student Lending Analytics Blog

WHAT: Live
Interactive Video Chat on College Affordability and the Student Aid and Fiscal
Responsibility Act (SAFRA)

WHO: YOU, Secretary
of Education Arne Duncan, and White House Domestic Policy Advisor Melody
Barnes.

WHEN: Tuesday, March
2 from 5:30 to 6:00 PM EST.

WHERE: On the White
House website HERE or Facebook HERE

Secretary
Duncan and Melody will share information on the Student Aid and Fiscal
Responsibility Act and talk about how you can help in making higher education
affordable and accessible to everyone. The conversation will be moderated by
William Jawando from the White House Office of Public Engagement. At the end,
you will have the opportunity to ask Secretary Duncan and Melody questions
– so we hope you think of some good ones! (Note that this web chat is closed
press and for background purposes only.)

View full post on Student Lending Analytics Blog

Register for this webinar, which has a $99 registration fee, here.

Among the questions to be answered:

• Which for-profit, non-profit and state agency lenders are still providing private education loans?
• What are the main drivers behind the projected decline in the private student loan market in 2009-10?
• What is the projected market shares in 2009-10 for the major private student lenders?
• How are private loan interest rates changing? 
• What are some new products/new developments to watch out for in the future? 
• How
  are financial aid offices responding to the new preferred lender
  regulations and how will this likely impact lender marketing strategies
  going forward?
• What other legislative activity could impact this market?
• How are lenders implementing the recently enacted private student loan disclosure requirements?
• How are schools implementing the new self-certification form for private student loans. 

View full post on Student Lending Analytics Blog

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• How is the rising tide of student loan defaults going to be managed?  
  • When the largest servicer says that they can't make contact with delinquent borrowers for the contracted rate of $0.90, I get a bit concerned. 
  • Almost nine months into income-based repayment (often seen as a panacea), I think it is time for a full accounting of how the implementation has gone for both Direct and FFEL servicers.  
• What can be done to improve college affordability aside from increasing the supply of grants and loans available to students which have historically had difficulty keeping up with the rate of tuition inflation?

• What specific efforts should be made at the institutional level to assist low-income students, who tend to make up a disproportionate share of loan defaults?

• From Paul Combe of ASA commenting on recent SLA post:  "The big
  question is, will “default prevention,” encompassing the kind of
  proactive contact and education services that borrowers really need to
  keep their loans in good standing, be funded? Like anything in life,
  prevention costs more in the short-term but less in the long-term; as a
  nation, do we have the gumption to do the right thing in this case and
  provide education loan borrowers the quality of services they deserve?

What other questions would you like to see asked at a student aid summit? 

View full post on Student Lending Analytics Blog

Specifically, the program will be offered to incoming freshmen who
already have at least 12 college credit hours, either through Advanced
Placement or community college classes, or other accelerated work. By
paring a year off their undergraduate experiences, those students would
save an estimated $8,000, or 22 percent, in tuition, room, board and
other fees, compared to their peers in four-year programs."

From the News-Observer: 

"UNC Greensboro plans to become the first public university in North
Carolina to help students earn an undergraduate degree in just three
years.

The
university announced the initiative Monday, joining a growing number of
schools across the country that have created similar programs to help
students save a year of tuition. Last month, Mount Olive College, a
private, liberal arts school based in Wayne County, announced a similar
program."

Here were some statistics I found in a Washington Post article that are somewhat dated about prevalence of three-year degrees:

"The most recent statistics from the Education Department, from 2001,
show that 4.2 percent of U.S. undergraduates finished with bachelor's
degrees in three years, 57.3 percent graduated in four years and 38.5
percent took more than four years to graduate."

So, what other colleges are actively marketing a three-year undergraduate degree program (my sense is that many schools already offer that option for high schoolers entering with significant AP credits)?

Here were a few I found after about 20 minutes of searching:

• Bates College
• Ball State University
• Hartwick College
• Lipscomb University
• Manchester College
• University of Washington
• University of Charleston (West Virginia) – Business
• Franklin and Marshall College
• University of Houston-Victoria (Fall 2010)
• Georgia Perimeter College (Fall 2010)
• Ursuline College
• Lynn University (Fall 2010)
• Southern Oregon University
• Mount Olive (Fall 2010)

I wonder how the results would differ today as to why students select a three-year program.  In this 1973 report found the top three reasons were:  graduate or professional school faster (36.5%), save money (34.1%) and avoid general freshman courses (12.8%).  My hunch is that saving money would trump all responses today. 

View full post on Student Lending Analytics Blog

View full post on Student Lending Analytics Blog