<p>here is where you can find a summary of h.r. 2669 which was passed by congress recently:</p>
<p>rpc.senate.gov/_files/090607ConfHighlightsHR2669DB.pdf</p>
<p>comments anyone?</p>
<p>Here's a breakdown of HR 2669:</p>
<p>The Good</p>
<p>• Pell Grant increases and related benefits to Pell recipients
• Broader eligibility for Academic Competitiveness Grants
• Student income protection allowance increase
• Simplified means test qualifications expanded
• Automatic zero expected family contribution (EFC) income increase
• New EFC calculations lowering out of pocket costs
• Stafford Loan rate reductions
• Lender subsidy reductions
• Student loan forgiveness benefits
• Student loan deferment benefits for veterans
• Perkins Loan program continuation
• More awareness of the true cost of college
• Additional college grant aid for Pell recipients in co-op educational programs
• New TEACH Grant program
• Creation of Centers of Excellence
• Additional funding for historically Black Colleges & Universities and Minority-Serving Institutions
• New College Access Challenge Grant program
• Restoration of funding for Upward Bound projects</p>
<p>The Bad</p>
<p>• Other than a subsidized Stafford Loan rate reduction, millions of non-Pell Grant recipients are left with few alternatives
• Student owned 529 Savings Plans will no longer be exempt from assessments
• No provision for families who don’t qualify for need-based financial aid<br>
• Unsubsidized Stafford Loan rates will not decrease</p>
<p>The Ugly</p>
<p>• If the 2008 budget cuts to pay for the above benefits are implemented, the Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant (SEOG) will no longer exist, and millions of the neediest students will be left behind
• Stafford Loan increases for 3rd and 4th year students, from $5,500 - $7,500, will actually benefit colleges, as they will reduce their portion of aid dollar for dollar and save an additional $2,000 per year!
• Dennis Chavez, SUNY Binghamton Director of Financial Aid Services stated, “… an increase in the loan limit allowed for students needs to be raised.”</p>
<p>They are raising the loan limits for 3rd and 4th year students?</p>
<p>yes they are. also the loan aggregate limits for grads and undergrads are going up as well--i dont have the exact figures yet--look for my next post and i will inform you when i find out the figures.</p>
<p>by the way, did you know that they are also eliminating worksheet A from the fafsa? thats good news for welfare and social security beneficiaries to name 2. it means that social security and welfare benefits, for example, will not count towards the efc.</p>
<p>baker101460</p>
<p>ok nikkiil. here are the loan aggregate figures:</p>
<p>for dependent students it is going up to $30500 total from $23000</p>
<p>for independent students it is going up to $53500 total from $46000</p>
<p>dependent grad students get somewhere close to $75000 total and independent grad students get close to $150000 (sorry i barely glanced at the graduate aggregate figures, but the figures i just quoted are close to being correct---maybe someone will chime in and report the correct amount for you graduate students out there)</p>
<p>Wonderful.....I mean, just when are they going to formally announce this information to the schools issuing the financial aid? They had better get a move on it!!</p>
<p>okay...color me blonde, or overworked....but I cannot find reference to increasing the aggregate loan limits or 3rd and 4th year award maximum in this bill....am I looking at the wrong sections or is it a different bill? I don't even see this as a "heads up" in any FAA organization newletter or bulletin....HELP!!!</p>
<p>Nikkil - I think this is the right version of the bill (it is surprisingly hard, considering the digitil age we are living in) to find the information - it does refer to increasing loan limits. On the other hand it also talks about Pell grant limits that do not seem at all in line with what I have read elsewhere. Having read over parts of the bill I have renewed respect for you financial aid officers - it is all remarkably hard to interpret.
<a href="http://www.thomas.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:HR02669:@@@L&summ2=m&%5B/url%5D">http://www.thomas.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:HR02669:@@@L&summ2=m&</a></p>
<p>Does anyone know when the President is supposed to sign this into law, or has he already?</p>
<p>Thank you Swimcat for the information....Once again, it seems like FAA's are the last to learn of financial aid changes by Congress.</p>
<p>precollegemom</p>
<p>it should be signed sometime before october 1 (that is the date that some of the provisions of the bill go into effect).</p>
<p>now i have read somewhere that bush will sign it into law this week...</p>
<p>stay tuned!</p>
<p>swimcatsmom...
Most of the text in your link is from the bill the House passed earlier, so you are right that the Pell Grant amounts ended up much lower than the numbers in the link.
Looking at the bigger picture, I don't think people realize that the loans and grants are better characterized as college aid rather than as student aid. Someone pointed out that the bigger total Stafford Loans by year will have the practical effect of colleges calculating larger loans in aid packages, often saving the schools from coming out of their own pockets for scholarship money. My son "received " Pell Grants for 4 years. This simply saved his school (an Ivy) the amount of the Pell Grants. It had no financial effects for him or for his family. He also received SEOGs. Same non-effect. So no tears shed here for ending SEOGs, and no joy about increasing Pell Grant amounts.</p>
<p>Danas - for us and probably most people not in Ivies the pell grants make a big difference. My kids are at State schools and there is little in the way of institutional need based aid other than loans - so federal grants mean less loans - a very big deal to us. Between merit and federal aid my D just has a little in loans - if she got the SEOG she would have no loans. My problem with the SEOG is that how it is awarded seems invisible - she has a very low EFC but did not get it. I would prefer the Pell was increased more as I know exactly what she can expect to get from that whereas the seog I have no clue how the school decides who will get it (says the students with the lowest EFCs - she is one of those). Is it a definite that the SEOG is gone? It seems it is just not mentioned in the bill. They were talking about doing away with the Perkins also but I think I saw that was still there.</p>
<p>I wondered if I had the correct version of the bill. I am amazed at how hard it is to find the information - I thought I could find about anything on the internet. But even when I do find stuff I am left somewhat baffled - like the changes to the simplified needs tests - remove 'or' from section blah sub section blah blah - why can't they just write it out in plain English. No wonder they end up with weird loopholes.</p>
<p>and no wonder so many mistakes happen in financial aid offices. If you are having a difficult time accessing the information, picture what we go through, especially when we have an issue which falls into those ugly gray areas created by Congress...who obviously has never utilized financial aid.</p>
<p>Nikkil - I really feel for you guys. I am so baffled by the wording in the bills. I would think it would be easier to rewrite a whole section rather that remove this from here, make section ii section iii, insert blah blah blah and make it section ii. Kind of makes me wonder if 'they' even know exactly what they are voting for.</p>
<p>I know and that is a battle we fight every day. Thankfully, some of our guarantee agencies have hired experts who deal strictly with the leagalities of the Congressional babels. Hopefully, our expert will get it straight in time for me to change my paperwork!</p>
<p>swimcatsmom...
Thank you for your post. I am ready to learn from you.
At the same time, the fact that you and I have trouble figuring out the rules, and that I imagine the financial aid offices for which this is bread and butter are on top of the particulars, argues that this is legislation for them rather than for us.
This is real to me because my daughter started her first year of college yesterday and I have a 12 year old still to come. The only insulation from the politicians/academics seems to be my kids' smarts and accomplishments. The better they do in the admissions game the more they tap the wealth that came before them and the less vulnerable they are to others, including the government.</p>
<p>Just for future reference, CRS publishes a brief summary of all bills on the THOMAS website:</p>
<p><a href="http://thomas.loc.gov%5B/url%5D">http://thomas.loc.gov</a></p>
<p>Once you type in the Bill number and find the bill, there should be a table with a link to a CRS summary.</p>
<p>That way, you don't have to strain your eyes trying to decipher Congressional mumbo-jumbo. Occasionally, for bigger bills, CRS publishes reports on specific bills, but these are only available to Members of Congress and their respective staff members. Still, you can access CRS reports (a treasure trove of information) at OpenCRS or other sources.</p>
<p>According to the thomas web site and the govtrack site the bill was presented to the President on September 19th (yesterday).</p>