Social Security

Oct 6, 2021

SBPC Statement on Department of Education Announcement to Overhaul the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program

The Department of Education announced steps to overhaul the notoriously troubled Public Service Loan Forgiveness program. In response to this announcement, Student Borrower Protection Center Executive Director Seth Frotman released the following statement.

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Blogs

Oct 4, 2021

For Servicemembers Pursuing Public Service Loan Forgiveness, the Fight Continues

Yesterday, a group of brave active duty servicemembers was featured sharing their firsthand accounts of student loan challenges with CBS News’ “60 Minutes” show.

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News Clips

Oct 3, 2021

Military members promised student debt relief in exchange for ten years of public service say promise is often broken

Seth Frotman heads an advocacy group called the Student Borrower Protection Center. He says borrowers should have started getting relief through the forgiveness program four years ago – a decade after it started – but over 9 out of 10 military members who have applied for debt relief have been turned down.

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News Clips

Oct 1, 2021

Education Dept. to Overhaul the Troubled Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program

The changes will come in two phases — a long-term renovation to make the program easier to navigate, achieved through the federal process known as rulemaking, and a temporary move using the department’s executive authority to retroactively relax the program’s rules to immediately help thousands of affected borrowers.

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Press Releases

Sep 30, 2021

SBPC Applauds the Confirmation of Rohit Chopra as CFPB Director

Today, the U.S. Senate voted to confirm current FTC Commissioner Rohit Chopra to be the next Director of the CFPB. In response, SBPC Executive Director Seth Frotman issued the following statement.

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Reports

Sep 30, 2021

Driving Into a Dead End: Why IDR Has Failed Millions with Decades-Old Debts

This report synthesizes evidence identifying various glaring warning signs that Income-Driven Repayment is failing millions of borrowers who have been in repayment for decades on federal student loans—and that it is slated to continue doing so for years to come.

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Blogs

Sep 30, 2021

Millions of Low-Income Student Loan Borrowers Deserve Better than Another Dead End

We now know that a generation of student loan borrowers remain trapped in this broken system and that, without structural changes by ED, IDR will not offer a viable way out for these borrowers in the future.

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Press Releases

Sep 28, 2021

SBPC Statement on Navient Ending its Role as Federal Student Loan Servicer

In response to this announcement, SBPC Executive Director and former top student loan industry watchdog at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Seth Frotman released the following statement.

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Reports

Sep 27, 2021

Driving Inequity: Are IDR’s Documentation Requirements Hurting Borrowers of Color?

This report examines the role that the use of alternative documentation of income plays in driving racial disparities in access to Income-Driven Repayment for student loan borrowers.

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Blogs

Sep 27, 2021

Policy Choices are Driving Racial Disparities in Access to Income-Driven Repayment

A new SBPC report sounds a warning that failures in the design of the IDR application process may exacerbate the unevenness of pandemic recovery along racial lines.

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Blogs

Sep 23, 2021

Public Service Workers Who Did Everything Right are Being Blocked from Promised Loan Relief Because of Tricks and Traps

Too many public service workers with older federal loans discover they can’t get PSLF because they have the wrong type of loan, while industry and ED block these borrowers from taking steps to secure relief.

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Press Releases

Sep 22, 2021

Advocates Call on President Biden to Cancel Student Loan Debt for Public Service Workers

More than 200 organizations representing millions of public service workers from all corners of the country called on President Biden to fix the broken PSLF program and deliver promised student debt relief to borrowers.

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News Clips

Sep 21, 2021

Thousands of Teachers Rejected for Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program, New Data Shows

The disclosure suggests further bureaucratic problems with the management of the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program, which has come under fire from Democrats in recent years for rejecting more than 98 percent of all borrowers who applied.

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Letters & Memos

Sep 21, 2021

Letters to Federal Regulators on Income Share Agreements

In light of recent action by the CFPB to affirm that ISAs are a form of private student loan that must comply with all relevant state and federal consumer financial protections, the SBPC sent letters to a number of federal agencies highlighting the need for increased scrutiny of the ISA market.

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Investigations

Sep 20, 2021

Documents from the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency on Employer Certification Form Denials and Reasons for Denial

In an effort to continue investigating ongoing breakdowns denying borrowers access to PSLF, the American Federation of Teachers, the National Education Association, and the SBPC uncovered thousands of pages of documents from the company the Department of Education contracts with to manage PSLF: PHEAA.

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Blogs

Sep 20, 2021

PSLF Borrower Voices: Spotlighting Servicemembers Denied Earned Loan Forgiveness

Servicemembers across the country are continually being denied promised student loan relief through the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program even after a decade or more of service in uniform. This fact is a national disgrace.

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Blogs

Sep 17, 2021

IDR Aimed to Make Federal Student Loans Affordable. It Made Them Even More of a Debt Trap.

Policymakers designed a system that assumed the amount of debt borrowers take on is largely immaterial, and the result is that millions of borrowers have been left to deal with the financial and psychological ramifications of decades of runaway debt.

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Reports

Sep 17, 2021

Driving Runaway Debt: How IDR’s Current Design Buries Borrowers Under Billions of Dollars in Unaffordable Interest

This report highlights how the design of the main protection meant to deliver affordability to federal student loan borrowers, Income-Driven Repayment (IDR), ignores the widespread effects that runaway student loan balances have across borrowers’ financial lives.

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News Clips

Sep 14, 2021

The Curious Case of a Chameleon Zombie Coding School

That promise fell apart over several weeks in July when the entire school seemingly unraveled: Make School was sued for allegedly selling predatory educational financing products to its early students, the school’s accreditation application was denied, financial backers apparently backed out, and students were absorbed by a separate school.

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Comments

Sep 13, 2021

Advocates Public Comment to Department of Education on Federal Preemption and Joint Federal-State Oversight of Federal Student Loan Servicing and Collections

In a public comment to ED, SBPC, American Federation of Teachers, AFL-CIO, Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund, Center for Responsible Lending, and the National Consumer Law Center, representing students, student loan borrowers, teachers, and consumers, applaud ED’s affirmation that states are important partners in protecting student loan borrowers and call for more support by states as they continue this important work.

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SBPC Statement on Department of Education Announcement to Overhaul the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program

For Servicemembers Pursuing Public Service Loan Forgiveness, the Fight Continues

Military members promised student debt relief in exchange for ten years of public service say promise is often broken

Education Dept. to Overhaul the Troubled Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program

SBPC Applauds the Confirmation of Rohit Chopra as CFPB Director

Driving Into a Dead End: Why IDR Has Failed Millions with Decades-Old Debts

Millions of Low-Income Student Loan Borrowers Deserve Better than Another Dead End

SBPC Statement on Navient Ending its Role as Federal Student Loan Servicer

Driving Inequity: Are IDR’s Documentation Requirements Hurting Borrowers of Color?

Policy Choices are Driving Racial Disparities in Access to Income-Driven Repayment

Public Service Workers Who Did Everything Right are Being Blocked from Promised Loan Relief Because of Tricks and Traps

Advocates Call on President Biden to Cancel Student Loan Debt for Public Service Workers

Thousands of Teachers Rejected for Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program, New Data Shows

Letters to Federal Regulators on Income Share Agreements

Documents from the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency on Employer Certification Form Denials and Reasons for Denial

PSLF Borrower Voices: Spotlighting Servicemembers Denied Earned Loan Forgiveness

IDR Aimed to Make Federal Student Loans Affordable. It Made Them Even More of a Debt Trap.

Driving Runaway Debt: How IDR’s Current Design Buries Borrowers Under Billions of Dollars in Unaffordable Interest

The Curious Case of a Chameleon Zombie Coding School

Advocates Public Comment to Department of Education on Federal Preemption and Joint Federal-State Oversight of Federal Student Loan Servicing and Collections

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