VITAL LINKS:
1820 copper sculpture ordered from W.H. Mullin Catalog - Salem, OH - currently under conservation at Municipal Bldg. - Augusta, GA
VITAL FINANCIAL AID LINKS
http://studentaid.gov 1-800-FED-AID
http://www.finaid.org/sitemap/ - is a comprehensive and relatively simple site for understanding most aspects of student aid.
http://www.benefits.gov/ is here to serve you! Find more than 1,000 Federal and state benefits including housing, food/nutrition, education, grants/loans, disaster relief and Medicare/Medicaid. Getting started is simple: Click the "Start Now" button on the homepage to begin your one-stop search for government assistance programs today
http://www.whitehouse.gov/issues/education/higher-education/college-score-card - Federal site for helping choose your college.
www.gradsense.org - is an interactive debt-to-salary calculator, simple-to-use tool - click on desired degree, field of study, and more specific job after graduating - calculate salary and debt
in.gov/cashforcollege - equips students and families with practical steps needed to save for college and provides information about the financial aid process
http://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/ - Another tool for helping you choose and compare colleges.
http://advocacy.collegeboard.org/college-affordability-financial-aid
http://completionarch.collegeboard.org/ - tool for comparing community colleges
http://www.nslds.ed.gov/nslds_SA/ - The National Student Loan Data System site will retrieve all your student loan data for you.
https://studentloans.gov/myDirectLoan/index.action - Federal Student Aid site.
http://studentaid.ed.gov/prepare-for-college/choosing-schools/consider/budget-calculator - Budget calculator for estimating costs during school.
http://www.studentloanborrowerassistance.org/ - The National Consumer Law Center’s Student Loan Borrower Assistance Project is a resource for borrowers, their families, and advocates representing student loan borrowers.
http://www.collegeaccess.org/ - The National College Access Network's mission is to build, strengthen, and empower communities committed to college access and success so that all students, especially those underrepresented in postsecondary education, can achieve their educational dreams.
https://studentloans.gov/myDirectLoan/index.action - is used to electronically submit initial loan forms or IBR/PayAsYouEarn/ICR repayment plan form.
http://studentaid.ed.gov/repay-loans/understand/plans - is used to learn about the different income-based repayment plans - SEE ALSO THE SECOND SITE ON THIS LIST FOR BETTER EXPLANATION OF PLANS.
http://www.finaid.org/loans/rehabilitation.phtml - provides a good explanation of loan rehabilitation process.
http://collegecost.ed.gov/ - is the site for the Higher Education Opportunity Act on college costs.
www.fastweb.com - is a non-govt. resource for scholarship matching and financial aid.
LOAN FORGIVENESS PROGRAMS:
www.equaljusticeworks.com
http://www.finaid.org
www.Benefits.gov
FOR THE MILITARY:
military.com/Resources/ResourcesContent/
http://www.servicememberscivilreliefact.com/?gclid=CL2f45ud5boCFcc7OgodplUAKA
http://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/pay-leave/student-loan-repayment/
www.Benefits.gov
STUDENT LOAN GROUPS:
http://www.studentloanjustice.org/ - This is the national site, founded by Alan Collinge, author of The Student Loan Scam. There are 50 state chapters of this organization in Facebook - join yours!
http://www.guidestar.org/SearchResults.aspx - Guidestar.org is a non-profit organization that gathers and publishes information about all IRS-registered non-profits. Here are the 890 search results for student loans - many are scholarships and grants.
http://asa.org/ - American Student Assistance
www.ticas.org/ - The Institute For College Access and Success
projectonstudentdebt.org - an initiative of The Institute for College Access & Success
projectonstudentdebt.org/state_by_state-data.php - Project on Student Debt: State by State Data
strikedebt.org/act - offshoot of Occupy Student Debt & Occupy Wall Street
http://www.nedap.org/ - a legal services nonprofit based in NYC
http://www.studentunionism.org/find-a-union/ - find a student union near you
http://studentdebtcrisis.org - non-profit org. founded by Robert Applebaum, most recent campaign was the "Out With Student Debt" video campaign - also has a FB page
StopSallieMae.weebly.org - it is what it says - if everyone read this (and the latest CFPB reports), Sallie Mae would be outta business
http://iamnotaloan.org - is calling on colleges to pledge to reduce student debt
http://signup.savethestudents.com - A collaborative blog on the student debt crisis and how it is killing The American Dream. Follow on FB or twitter
Academic Sites:
http://muse.jhu.edu/about/index.html - Project MUSE is a leading provider of digital humanities and social science content for the scholarly community. Since 1995, MUSE is the most trusted source of complete, full-text versions of scholarly journals from many of the world's leading university presses and scholarly societies, with over 120 publishers currently participating
www.hamiltonproject.org to find the latest papers, graphs, events and news, register for Hamilton Project updates, and try out the interactive jobs gap calculator
http://www.ashe.ws/?page=186 - Founded in 1930, The Journal of Higher Education is published by The Ohio State University Press at the Association for the Study of Higher Education and is the leading scholarly journal on the institution of higher education
chronicle.com/section/Home/5/
www.insidehighered.com
www.educationsector.org
The Economist - http://www.economist.com/
http://asa.org/pdfs/corporate/life-delayed.pdf - 2013 - about the effects of student loans on your life!
http://www.consumerfinance.gov/reports/private-student-loans-report/ - CFPB report on private student loans, July 19, 2012
http://files.consumerfinance.gov/f/201310_cfpb_student-loan-ombudsman-annual-report.pdf - Annual Report of the CFPB Student Loan Ombudsman, Oct., 2013
http://asa.org/pdfs/corporate/consumer-finance-protection-bureau-private-loan-comments.pdf - ASA's comments about the CFPB's doc on private loans
http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/07/01/248455/ - Households owing student loan debts at record levels
http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2012/09/26/a-record-one-in-five-households-now-owe-student-loan-debt/ - A Record One-in-Five Households Now Owe Student Loan DebtBurden Greatest on Young, Poor
http://users.nber.org/~dynarski/THP_DynarskiDiscPaper_Final.pdf - The Hamilton Project - Loans for Educational Opportunity: Making Borrowing Work for Today's Students. By Susan Dynarski and Daniel Kreisman. October, 2013. (This paper shows how to "fix" the current system. ALSO, if you look towards the end, you will see representative loan payments under the current system and under the proposed system. Do NOT, however, be fooled into thinking this is what you'll be paying. Only your loan provider can tell you that and it WILL CHANGE, depending on the circumstances.)
http://futureofchildren.org/futureofchildren/publications/docs/23_01_04.pdf - Financial Aid Policy: Lessons from Research by Susan Dynarski and Judith Scott-Clayton, May, 2013. (mostly deals with the complexity of the whole loan process, from application to default)
http://users.nber.org/~dynarski/w19552.pdf - THE MISSING MANUAL:USING NATIONAL STUDENT CLEARINGHOUSE DATA TO TRACK POSTSECONDARY OUTCOMES - by Susan M. Dynarski, Steven W. Hemelt and Joshua M. Hyman. 2013
Recommended Reading!
Collinge, Alan M. The Student Loan Scam: The Most Oppressive Debt in U.S. History - and How We Can Fight Back. Boston: Beacon Press, 2009. Print.
Reynolds, Glenn H. The Higher Education Bubble. New York: Encounter Books, 2012. Print.
MoveOn.org. 50 Ways to Love Your Country. Makawao: Inner Ocean, 2004. Print. (political advocacy)
Silverberg, David. Congress for Dummies. New York: Wiley, 2002. Print.
And a number of assorted articles. Until I get them up, you can start with the list at StudentLoanJustice.org, on the front page.
http://blog.livetext.com/blog/bid/345878/Who-says-we-don-t-need-no-education?goback=%2Egde_5187932_member_5809687246315466753#%21 - about MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses - good overview/intro on Wikipedia)
http://diverseeducation.com/article/17039/?goback=%2Egde_5187932_member_5809689820372426752#%21
- about new internet tool to compare community colleges (tool at
http://completionarch.collegeboard.org/)
Government Sites - Political:
Whitehouse.gov
How to find your Congressmen: by zip code, (note your district) http://www.congressmerge.com/onlinedb/cgi-bin/newmemberbio.cgi?lang=en&member=NC13&site=congressmerge&address=&city=&state=NC&zipcode=&plusfour=
The phone and fax show up beside your representative's names, along with a link to their individual websites. Here you will find all their contact information, including email, phone numbers, office addresses, and other pertinent information. Remember, these are your Senators and Representatives in the House: sending messages to other politicians on the Hill is pretty much a waste of time, unless you have been requested or invited to submit information on current legislation or events. Remember what our Senate-insider said in "How to write a constituent letter that will actually make a difference." Communications with politicians other than your own get trashed. Please re-read this valuable piece before contacting your rep - you won't regret it.
Notwithstanding the warnings about dealing with other politicians, I've provided websites for these committees and organizations so you can monitor their progress, if you wish. There are a couple of other committees that have been assigned to student loan bills, but you can track them down yourself if you're particularly interested about what may have happened to a bill. Remember, most of them DON'T get to become law; but with HELP working on the HEA, we can probably push a couple of them through and hopefully we'll have more chances for input on the HEA changes.
Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP): http://www.help.senate.gov/about/contact/
This is their main website where you can access the calendar, legislation, etc. and watch hearings from C-Span if you want.
House Committee on Education and the Workforce:
https://edworkforce.house.gov/contact/
This is the committee's main website where, as with the Senate committee, you can access the calendar, current student ed. news and legislation, or sit in on the hearings. They also have sub-committees - two that we're interested in: (1) The Sub-committee on Higher Education and Workforce Training and (2)The Sub-committee on Health, Employment, Labor and Pensions. They have live webcasts on student loans - I try to keep you informed on front page or on my news page "What's Happening Now".
(StudentLoanJustice.org's Alan Collinge alerted many of us earlier this year about writing letters in response to the subject of student loans in general, which was a mighty broad subject to tackle. Remember on the "What Can I Do" page, the reference to CFPB's request for you to "tell your story"? This is your big chance - probably only comes around every 20 years. You know you'll be heard and you'll probably make a difference. Besides, if you don't try, you can't gripe about the current state of things and you'll always regret not doing it. Even if you only have a little bit of experience or knowledge in the area, or if your writing skills aren't that great, you need to share. Sharing may keep someone else from being taken advantage of or suffering. Besides, it's good for you to vent your frustrations, sort them out and get them out in the open. Don't miss this chance - now is the time and you are the hero. You won't get another chance like this.) Be sure to check the right margin for other places to submit your story.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau: has a student loan ombudsman that will assist all borrowers experiencing problems taking out a private student loan, repaying their private student loan, or managing a student loan that has gone into default and may have been referred to a debt collector. You can use their online form for complaints about private student lenders, or about servicers and collectors of all types of loans: http://www.consumerfinance.gov/complaint/#student-loan
They have several phone numbers, addresses and emails, which can be found at http://www.consumerfinance.gov/contact-us/
SEE PAGE http://www.consumerfinance.gov/blog/category/students/ FOR ALL KINDS OF INFORMATION THAT THE CFPB WANTS YOUR INPUT ON!
Ombudsman: http://studentaid.ed.gov/repay-loans/disputes/prepare - The ombudsman office was created to help borrowers with difficult problems, which they can submit problems online. Phone: 877-557-2575 Fax: 202-275-0549. Address: U.S. Department of Education, FSA Ombudsman, 830 First Street, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20202-5144. A more complete list of ombudsmen who can help you may be found here: http://www.studentloanborrowerassistance.org/resources/referral-resource/ombudsman-programs/
The DOJ and the FTC both have written, specific agreements with the CFPB on who handles what and communicating to keep from duplicating or wasting time, money, and work. They also let each other know about the complaints they get in the line of duty. Since the CFPB is the org. concerned with student loans, that's who's contact info. I've provided. However, keep in mind that in some cases you may need the FTC or the DOJ - remember, they're on your side!
LEGISLATION SITES:
Congress.gov
Congress.org
Popvox
govtrack.us
votesmart.org
regulations.gov
opencongress.org
senate.gov
http://www1.realclearpolitics.com/congressional_bill_tracker/
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/ - US Govt. Printing Office
www.ask.com/Bills+In+Congress
http://edworkforce.house.gov/issues/issue/?IssueID=8537 - lists all current events and legislation for higher education in the House of Representatives' Committee on Education and the Workforce.
www.washingtonwatch.com/
for android and ios:
congress.sunlightfoundation.com/
how to write a bill:
www.dummies.com/how-to/content/building-a-bill-in-congress.html
live on the Senate floor:
http://gov.mtopgroup.com/art1/live/senate
MEDIA:
http://thehill.com
http://www.insidehighered.com/ - Inside Higher Ed - Good paper and completely free.
http://chronicle.com/section/Home/5/ - The Chronicle of Higher Education - weekly paper - probably the most comprehensive news you will find on U.S. higher ed. Full access is NOT cheap.
www.theguardian.com/us
www.politico.com - check out the morning education section
drudge report
C-span.org
PETITION SITES:
WeThePeople - You must get 150 signatures yourself before they will publish your petition on Whitehouse.gov, where it will get properly publicized. If you get 100,000 signatures in 30 days, the petition will be reviewed, and responded to, by the White House. Each signer of the petition will get an email from the White House.
MoveOn.org
Change.org
Causes.com
GoPetition.com
Reddit.com - search "petitions"
Care2PetitionSite.com
ipetitions.com
petitiononline.com
http://www.activism.com/en_US/
http://www.avaaz.org/en/
VARIOUS OTHER SITES:
https://www.facebook.com/reformstudentloansnow
www.defaultmovie.com - Default: The Student Loan Documentary
http://getoutofdebt.org - Steve Rhodes, the famous get-out-of-debt guy: if he can't help you get out of your school loans, he'll keep you from getting scammed by someone who says they can.
http://genprogress.org/actions/2013/08/22/21857/make-college-more-affordable/ - generation progress - sign up to show your support for making college more affordable. There's also a section on t his site focusing directly on for-profit school abuses AND THEY WANT YOUR STORY - http://genprogress.org/actions/2013/08/05/21659/for-profit-college-students-speak-out-about-abuses/
http://www.campusactivism.org/displayissue-126.htm - Has a good list of groups, campaigns, and resources related to tuition and fees, amongst a plethora of other topics for advocates and activists.
Bureau of Indian Education - Resources - Higher Education
OPEN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES (OER)
http://creativecommons.org/education, http://creativecommons.org/tag/oer - OER using Creative Commons Licensing cost users nothing - you just need access to a computer. From the basics to specifics, these 2 links can get you started. This is the new trend in education - equal and free access for everyone, everywhere.
http://www.gse.harvard.edu/news-impact/2013/11/harvard-edcast-edx-marks-the-spot/
http://www.apple.com/apps/itunes-u/ - over 500,000 free lectures, videos, books from top universities - from law to Shakespeare to languages, learn it from itunes U for free!