Student Loan & Consolidation Consumers Union Report
The Consumers Union is a Yonkers, N.Y.-based nonprofit thats asks the government, schools, and lenders to provide more and better information to the borrower. You would amazed at some of the quotes from their report.
According to the US News and World Report article these were some of the things said:
A sophmore in a two year school in Boston said, "You can just put (tuition) on your credit card, and you don't have to take out a loan."
A sophomore at a Los Angeles-area community college took out a private loan at 11 percent interest and was suspicious that there was "a catch" to the 6.8 percent interest rate for federal Stafford loans.
The Consumers Union report contributed to a lot of talk on Capital Hill regarding finacial aid and many journalists (including US & News World Reports) say that it contributed to the bill that comes into effect October 1st. The overall gist of the report is that students and parents are completely confused when it comes to financial aid, student loans, and student loan consolidation programs and stricter guidelines are in order.
Here's are links to the US News & World Reports article and the report from the Consumer's Union.
http://www.usnews.com/usnews/biztech/articles/070720/20loans.htm
http://www.consumersunion.org/pdf/CU-College.pdf
