The Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) Simplification Act made several changes to the FAFSA, including changing the formula for determining student financial assistance need and simplifying the application. The rollout of the redesigned 2024-2025 FAFSA application encountered issues that affected students' ability to apply for aid.…

College promise programs can be found in every state in the country, though they vary widely in design. Most programs aim to reduce the tuition and fees students pay with the goal of increasing educational attainment and reducing the financial burden on students. The NC Promise policy functions in this space by reducing tuition for all students…

Faced with higher education (HE) expansion and limited public funding, governments worldwide use student loans to shift costs onto graduates. Income-contingent loans (ICLs) are considered a potential solution, protecting debtors from excessive loan repayments, financial hardship, and default. Governments adopting ICLs promote them as benign while…

For workers employed in the public and nonprofit sectors, the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program offers the potential for full forgiveness of federal student loans for those with 10 years of full-time work experience. A year-long waiver issued by the Department of Education in 2021 to address administrative problems in program access…

Transfer pathways are commonly associated with cost savings to students within the policy world. However, few have ventured to empirically examine whether traveling transfer pathways result in savings for students. Through this article, we report on analyses of this topic drawing on a custom linkage between Toronto District School Board,…

Outstanding federal student loan debt exceeds $1.6 trillion and is owed by about 45 million borrowers. Since taking office, the Biden Administration has taken various actions to address student loan debt. These actions have ranged in scope (both in terms of borrower populations affected and associated modification costs), rationales, and the…

In August 2022, the Department of Education announced that, to address the heightened risk of delinquency and default caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, it would provide up to $20,000 of student loan debt relief to borrowers who met certain income thresholds. Borrowers eligible for this relief were to receive up to the full $20,000 in relief if they…

The Biden administration is implementing a new income-driven repayment (IDR) plan for federal student loans called Saving on a Valuable Education (SAVE). The SAVE plan adds to existing IDR plans and reduces borrowers' monthly payments and shortens the time certain borrowers must repay before their debts are forgiven compared with current options.…

More students from non-traditional backgrounds will attend university in the future. Universities must have effective Support for Students Policies and should limit instances where students fail with little to no personal benefit, such as 'zero-fails' (failed units with a cumulative mark of zero). The aim of this action research study was to…

College loans serve as a double-edged sword for human capital investment: While they facilitate access to education, the burden of repayment may distort post-education investments in human capital. We examine the role of college loans and loan repayment policies through a structural model in which heterogeneous individuals, faced with borrowing…

Student debt was specifically addressed in the federal government's response to the COVID-19 pandemic through forbearance polices. However, not all individuals were eligible for forbearance, and it is possible that forbearance would leave some feeling further behind. Yet, little is known about student loan debt over the course of the pandemic,…

Each year, NASSGAP completes a survey regarding state-funded expenditures for postsecondary student financial aid. This report, the 54th annual survey, represents data from academic year 2022-23. Data Highlights include: (1) In the 2022-23 academic year, the states awarded almost $16.6 billion in total state funded student financial aid, an…

This dissertation examines the post-college career choices of no-loan program alumni at Harvard College. Using a conceptual framework informed by elements of social cognitive career theory (Lent et al., 1994) and Perna's (2006) model of college choice, it identifies "what" careers alumni chose after college and "how" and…

Levels of student loan debt in the United States are increasing exponentially every year, directly affecting the ability of millions to live a comfortable life. Student loan debt levels are an acute issue for borrowers of color, as they more often need federal loans to attend institutions of higher education in comparison to their White peers.…

This paper analyses potential links between extreme optimism and student loan debt. Prior work finds extreme optimism to be associated with imprudent household savings and investment decisions. This paper explores whether these findings are relevant to student loan decisions. Using the most recent administration of the Survey of Consumer Finances…