Blog

Mar 30, 2021

What ISA Providers and Predatory Mortgage Lenders Have in Common

The SBPC released a new analysis of a sample of ISA contracts offered by some of the largest ISA providers in the student financing market. What we found was cause for alarm. Despite representations by lenders that ISAs are “not a loan or credit,” our analysis concludes that a typical ISA is clearly both “credit” and a “private education loan” as defined under the federal Truth in Lending Act.

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Blogs

Mar 25, 2021

New Evidence Underscores the Fair Lending Risks Inherent to Income Share Agreements

We released a report revealing extensive evidence that the financial technology student lender Stride Funding, may be violating federal fair lending law, illustrating the deep fair lending risks inherent to Income Share Agreements.

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Blogs

Mar 22, 2021

Lawsuit Against DeVos Ends; Fight for Defaulted Borrowers Continues

On April 30, 2020, Student Defense and NCLC, with the support of the SBPC, filed a class action lawsuit against the Department of Education and then-Secretary Betsy DeVos, demanding an immediate halt to ED’s garnishment of student borrowers’ wages, which the CARES Act had prohibited since March 27, 2020.

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Blogs

Mar 19, 2021

Without Strong Consumer Protections, a History of Borrower Harm Will Repeat Itself During the COVID-Era Rise in Credentialization

With millions of newly unemployed Americans desperate for help, unscrupulous schools and lenders are pouncing. Without substantial, immediate, and sustained action, tens of billions of dollars will flow to predatory programs that will harm borrowers, their communities, and our country for decades to come—just like in the last recession.

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Blogs

Mar 11, 2021

Coding Bootcamps Offering ISAs May Be Unlawfully Depriving Students of the Ability to Protect Themselves from Fraud

The results of a new investigation published today by the SBPC offer new evidence that for-profit coding bootcamps and ISA companies may be systemically violating federal law by omitting a legally mandated term from the contracts underlying students’ ISAs—language required under the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) “Holder Rule.”

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Blogs

Mar 10, 2021

The CFPB Has the Tools to Rein in the Predatory For-Profit College Industry. It’s Time for It to Use Them.

An issue brief published by the SBPC and the Center for Consumer Law & Economic Justice at the UC Berkeley School of Law makes clear that the CFPB already has the power to hold for-profit colleges accountable for many of their worst practices and to protect borrowers from abuse.

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Blogs

Feb 16, 2021

It’s Time for Washington to Stand Up for Millions of Student Loan Borrowers Struggling Without Relief During COVID

The SBPC and the National Consumer Law Center wrote to the Department of Education to call for commercial FFELP borrowers to get desperately needed relief during COVID and for the Department to rectify past and present wrongs that have imposed historic hardship on these borrowers.

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Blogs

Feb 8, 2021

The CFPB Must Prioritize the Student Debt Crisis as a Civil Rights Crisis

Any comprehensive analysis and regulatory prioritization grounded in removing barriers to societal equity must acknowledge the racially disparate effects of the student debt crisis and the decades-long failure to effectively regulate the student loan industry.

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Blogs

Feb 2, 2021

Betsy DeVos’s Policies are Still Blocking Law Enforcement from Protecting Borrowers During COVID. It’s Time to Roll them Back.

The policies put in place by the Trump-era Education Department continue to obstruct critical law enforcement work required to clean up the market.

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Blogs

Feb 1, 2021

To Access COVID Relief Money, Colleges Should Protect Students from Institutional Debts

Unlike federal student loans, these debts do not come with special consumer protections or guaranteed repayment options, and they are not subject to the same current payment freeze. Yet these debts can completely upend a student’s educational aspirations and hang over borrowers’ heads for years.

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What ISA Providers and Predatory Mortgage Lenders Have in Common

New Evidence Underscores the Fair Lending Risks Inherent to Income Share Agreements

Lawsuit Against DeVos Ends; Fight for Defaulted Borrowers Continues

Without Strong Consumer Protections, a History of Borrower Harm Will Repeat Itself During the COVID-Era Rise in Credentialization

Coding Bootcamps Offering ISAs May Be Unlawfully Depriving Students of the Ability to Protect Themselves from Fraud

The CFPB Has the Tools to Rein in the Predatory For-Profit College Industry. It’s Time for It to Use Them.

It’s Time for Washington to Stand Up for Millions of Student Loan Borrowers Struggling Without Relief During COVID

The CFPB Must Prioritize the Student Debt Crisis as a Civil Rights Crisis

Betsy DeVos’s Policies are Still Blocking Law Enforcement from Protecting Borrowers During COVID. It’s Time to Roll them Back.

To Access COVID Relief Money, Colleges Should Protect Students from Institutional Debts

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