This post is adapted from US Department of Education Under Secretary James Kvaal’s remarks at the National College Attainment Network's (NCAN) Better FAFSA Train-the-Trainer Summit on July 20, 2023. It has been edited for clarity.
First, I want to express my gratitude for NCAN and the work (NCAN CEO) Kim Cook and her staff do. They know that the difference between students succeeding and failing is almost always the help they get from other human beings along the way.
I’m particularly grateful for NCAN’s work to help students, families, colleges – and the US Department of Education - successfully transition to the new Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). The new FAFSA will be easier and faster, and it will also help more students get the scholarships they need - but there is a lot of work for all of us.
And I want to say thank you to everyone who is here. Each one of you has an important role in helping students succeed in college - and in helping them understand and take advantage of the new form, the new formula, and new terminology. Your work makes
possible everything we do to help many more students earn college degrees. Thank you.
I am willing to bet that everyone here has a shared belief in the power of higher education to change a person’s life. Maybe NCAN puts it best in expressing its vision: “All students have an equitable opportunity to achieve social and economic mobility
through higher education.” That’s what US Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona wants too. That’s the animating goal of our higher education work.
The Supreme Court isn’t making that any easier. By limiting the use of race in college admissions, the Supreme Court rolled back decades of social progress. It totally missed the point: our country’s greatest strengths include the diversity of our people and our commitment to work toward equality.
But as President Biden said, “While the Court can render a decision, it cannot change what America stands for.” So, let’s not let this be the last word. Instead, let’s renew our commitment to opportunity for all students. Let’s focus on the many tangible
things we can do to promote equity in our communities. Let’s bring new urgency to building a better country.
On July 26, Secretary Cardona is convening higher education leaders to talk about what works in promoting opportunity for all students. We will be releasing more resources in the coming weeks. We will also keep working toward an inclusive higher education
system by investing in Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), minority-serving institutions, and community colleges; by putting money behind data-driven strategies proven to raise graduation rates; and by speaking out against an elitist
culture that values selectivity over inclusivity, high costs over affordability, and long-held reputations over student outcomes.
The very next day, the Court rejected President Biden’s plan for $20,000 in student debt relief. Congress also ended to the student loan payment pause. That means interest will begin accruing again on September 1. And in October, 28 million borrowers
will reenter repayment – that’s five times more than typically enter repayment in an entire year. Many borrowers are now confused and anxious and unsure how they will fit student loans into their monthly budgets. So, here’s what will happen next.
First, this week, we kicked off a new rulemaking process on student debt forgiveness. We are looking for ideas on how we can help as many working and middle-class students as possible. The process takes time, but we are going to move as fast as we can.
Second, we finalized the most affordable repayment plan ever, called the SAVE plan. It protects borrowers from making any payments if they earn less than about $15 an hour. All other borrowers will save at least $1,000 a year. And it stops runaway interest
- so borrowers paying what they owe each month won’t see loans growing due to unpaid interest.
Third, to help borrowers return to repayment successfully, we created a 12-month on-ramp to repayment. Payments are due, but for a temporary period, we will suspend adverse consequences like credit reporting.
Fourth, we are fixing loan forgiveness. Historically, most borrowers eligible for loan forgiveness were not getting it. For example, only 7,000 people had ever gotten Public Service Loan Forgiveness. That number is now 650,000. There were 800,000 borrowers
making payments for 25 years, but who hadn’t gotten the forgiveness they were due. Borrowers with disabilities, borrowers cheated by for-profit colleges – they were due forgiveness, but met with overly complex programs and bureaucratic indifference.
Altogether we’ve now identified 3.4 million borrowers who are eligible for forgiveness - and I am very proud of that work.
Finally, we need to stop unaffordable debts at the source. We have proposed the strongest-ever gainful employment standards for career colleges. And because there are unaffordable programs at all types of colleges, we want all students to know the hard
facts about their debts and likely earnings before they make decisions about how to pay for college.
Here’s the bottom line: We can’t return to the same broken system we had before the pandemic, when more than one million borrowers defaulted every year. We need to be able to say to students that federal loans are a smart investment in your future, not
a risky one, and that repaying your student loans won’t drain away the benefits that are supposed to come with college.
That brings me to Pell Grants. Pell Grants are one of the best investments we can make in a strong middle class and a strong economy. You may know that the founder of Pell Grants, Senator Claiborne Pell, came from a family of immense financial means.
He attended some of the nation’s most elite educational institutions. He traveled the world. Supposedly, he came up for the idea of scholarships for low-income college students while skiing in Switzerland.
And yet, he fundamentally believed that the opportunity to earn a college degree should be not be reserved to the wealthy few, but available to the striving many. Like 81 million other Americans, Pell Grant funding helped me afford to attend the college
of my dreams.
Today, over a third of all undergraduate students in America depend on the Pell Grant to pay for college – the vast majority of whom come from families who earn less than $40,000 a year. I’m proud that Pell grants are $900 bigger than they were two years
ago – and we are fighting for another big increase this year, even as we are expanding to include incarcerated students and fighting for DACA recipients. In fact, we should double Pell Grants – and President Biden’s budget proposal shows we can do
that within a responsible budget if we make the right choices.
And, with your help, we can help students get the Pell Grants they need, by simplifying the FAFSA. Research suggests that two million students are eligible for Pell Grants, but never applied. No one knows how many more people would enroll, if they could
get that help. The needlessly complex form, the outdated technology, and the exhausting verification process - they are not just headaches, they are real barriers to college success.
This year, that will change. Thanks to bipartisan legislation, there will be a new formula, a new form, and a whole new process for getting financial aid. It will be simpler, easier, and more secure for everyone to get financial aid. And more low-income
students will get scholarships.
There is still lot of work to reach this vision - not only for Office of Federal Student Aid, but also students and families, advisors, high schools, states, and, yes, colleges and universities. Everyone needs to get there together. In March, the
Department published the FAFSA Roadmap, laying out our plan to help our partners through this process. Expect a steady stream of training webinars, fact sheets, materials for counselors, specification guides for software developers, and previews.
Thank you for connecting these materials with the actual students we are trying to reach.
Last year, I met a young woman named Michelle Vasquez. Michelle told me that she had never even considered college until she overheard people talking about it in the hallway at school. She didn’t know what the word meant. Her friends laughed at her –
but also gave her some useful advice. They told her to study hard. She knew that, for her family, her education the way out of a dangerous neighborhood, facing housing discrimination, and a lack of basic necessities.
With no college savings, she relied on Pell Grants and other scholarships. And she went on to graduate from Trinity Washington University with a degree in political science, minors in business and data analytics, and serving as class president. She’s
now working as a consultant at Accenture.
That’s what this work is about. That’s what the FAFSA is for. And when the FAFSA is too confusing or overwhelming, that’s what it can cost us. So, thank you for your work to make the FAFSA work for people – and thank you again for what you do.
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