By the Collections Agitator

Let me explain. From the 1970s thru the early 2000s, many students seeking higher education financed their degrees, in part or in whole, via student loans. In that period, college financial aid offices worked with commercial banks (think Citibank, Chase, etc.) to fund student loans. While commercial banks funded the loans, the federal government was the guarantor should the borrower default on repayment. The Federal Family Education Loan Program (FFELP)/Stafford Loan was how non-wealthy families sent their kids to college. Frankly, for many Black and Brown households, this was the only path available to them to educate their children beyond high school. It was understood these loans were “federal student loans” that was the marketing; it was never questioned.

For many families of color, lacking generational wealth to pass on, Black and Brown children were told to pursue education as a means of improving their lives and lifting their families out of poverty. In my family, it was understood that to do better you had to get an education and move away from the service industries that typically offered low wages and little to no benefits. We optimistically drank the Kool-aid and went to school confident that once done, we would smash through the glass ceiling, repay our loans and reach back for those coming behind.

What Happened?

Fast forward to July 2010, the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act (HCERA) of 2010 eliminated commercial banks as middlemen. The Act empowered the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) to become a direct lender. Students and academic institutions now worked directly with the federal government to process loans and fund secondary education. Okay, not a problem because a federal student loan is a federal student loan—until it is not.

Once the DOE became a direct lender, earlier FFELP/Stafford loans were categorized as “private” loans. Why are they private loans- because commercial banks were once the student loan funding mechanism. The HCERA did not grandfather in nor convert them to Direct Federal Loans placing them under the jurisdiction of the DOE. In other words, the current debate about student loan forgiveness and proposed legislation to ease their burden exclude older borrowers whose loans are now designated “private” loans.

HCERA was enacted during the first two years of the Obama administration when Democrats also controlled both houses of congress. Democrats missed an opportunity to uplift millions of families and individuals whose student loans predate 2010 by relieving them from their financial stranglehold and the consequences arising from them such as bankruptcy and homelessness to name a few. This time around, it may be the more progressive block within the Democratic Party that champions the cause of all student loan borrowers and not just those under the DOE lending programs.

You may have options

As an earlier or “private” borrower, you can contact your loan servicer and request information that could bring your loans under the DOE. The oneness of knowing about the education funding change is not on the government agency charged (past and present) with protecting the borrower, but the individual. And what happens if, while your application is pending, the student loan forgiveness discussion progresses to enactment? Will your earlier loans be retroactively included-history suggests not. For more information about student loans, please visit https://studentaid.gov/

TRIBE, we cannot sit and let this happen without acting. How many of you does this federal omission, oversight, or disregard touch? What has the yoke of student loan debt caused you to forgo or delay? In Georgia, Stacey Abrams showed us what is possible when we engage. If you received your student loans prior to 2010 and still in repayment mode, write to your congressional representatives, Senators and House of Representative members and demand fair and equitable treatment by asking them to include you in any and all student loan forgiveness discussion and proposed relief legislation. You should also ask to be grandfathered under HCERA and/or enrolled in the DOE lending programs. It is not just younger borrowers needing help. Older borrowers are not only facing financial hardship like their younger counterparts but unlike them have a shorter work-life timeline.

Immediate Tasks: Let your voice be heard and your future vote be weighted. Act now and write or email your congressional representatives and ask to be represented in all student loan forgiveness discussions, programs and included in proposed student load debt relief legislation. Letters and emails serve two purposes: First, they provide the documentation heft that can be more thoroughly measured than say a phone call and second, we can use them to hold our elected officials accountable to us and remind them they must earn our vote come the next election cycle.