Congress Approves College Student Loan Bill
Posted by Jonah Mytro on September 19th, 2008
Legislation that seeks to protect college students from lending abuses while boosting student aid was approved by Congress on Thursday.
The bill, which would require lenders and colleges to adopt strict codes of conduct, passed the Senate 83-8 after the House voted 380-49 for the measure.
Once signed into law by President George W. Bush, the bill would ban lenders and colleges from offering or accepting payments or gifts in exchange for making loans, a response to scandals uncovered last year involving kickback schemes and conflicts of interest between lenders and school officials.
“We got rid of cronyism, kick backs and sweetheart deals,” said Sen. Barbara Mikulski, a Maryland Democrat who took over leadership on the bill after education committee chairman Sen. Edward Kennedy was diagnosed with a brain tumor.
Other features of the bill include increased funding for graduate study at institutions that primarily serve minorities and new scholarship programs and support centers for military veterans.
Pell grants that go to low-income students, would increase to $6,000 from $4,800 for 2009, and to $8,000 for 2014.
The bill follows other legislation passed during the last 10 months aimed at overhauling the student loan industry.
Tags: college degree loans, congress loan bill, student loans
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This entry was posted on Friday, September 19th, 2008 at 12:49 pm and is filed under College Scholarship and Loans. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
