Education

Coauthored by Joel Chapman

It’s often said that ignorance is bliss.  That’s certainly true for the Department of Education and their congressional allies who support direct lending.  When Congress abolished private participation in student lending and replaced it with 100 percent government financed student lending, they anticipated $75 billion in savings as a result of the switch.

Soon after the election, Secretary Duncan laid out the Administration’s goals for education reform over the next four years in remarks to both the Chief State School Officers and Foundation for Excellence in Education.   It should come as no surprise that those goals will continue to focus on policies that have failed to increase student academic achievement over the last four years.  He made it clear that he had little interest in pursuing the reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB).  Why should he when his Department has succeeded in dismantling the law

As the Congress and the President begin deliberations to avoid the fiscal budget cliff, discretionary spending cuts will be part of the equation in addition to entitlement and tax reform.  The education establishment and the powerful teacher unions have already sounded the alarm that education should not be on the table during these negotiations.   In addition, the President has consistently stated that we should invest more in education, not less, in order to improve our economy.  

While all eyes anxiously wait to see whether Congress and the administration can reach agreement to avert the fiscal cliff, federal financial aid faces a fiscal cliff all its own. 

The conclusion of the recent election finally brought relief to millions of voters tired of seeing political ads during every waking hour of television broadcasts across dozens of battleground states.  But once the ads disappear and reality sets in again, tough questions still linger about the cost of college and the future of federal financial aid.

An often-overlooked document issued by the Treasury Department every month should be raising alarms over the federal direct student loan program.

In the Final Monthly Treasury Statement for fiscal year 2012, issued at the end of September, the Treasury Department highlights spending by federal agencies and borrowing required to pay all of Uncle Sam’s bills. September’s statement summarizes just how deep the country went into the red for the previous fiscal year. 

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) was established as yet another layer of federal bureaucracy to prevent consumers from making bad financial decisions.  Yet as the number of direct student loan borrowers grows and loan volumes continue to rocket upward, the CFPB has chosen to focus on a small subset of ‘subprime’ student loans issued by private lenders.  That’s unfor

For the first time in 15 years, higher education enrollment in the United States fell. It is a widely shared concern that the U.S. is losing ground against developed nations in terms of college attainment rates.  While enjoying a relatively high proportion of college-educated adults, this most recent data highlights that the U.S. doesn’t hold the same advantage in the developed world that we used to.