USA Funds Excellence in Debt Management Awards announced
INDIANAPOLIS - USA Funds®, the nation's leading education loan guarantor, has announced the recipients of its annual excellence in debt management awards. USA Funds has selected the following four postsecondary institutions for awards of merit based on their efforts to help students minimize and manage their student loan debt:
Career Colleges of America - The three campuses of this career college in Southern California prepare students for health care and office administration careers. The school's default prevention manager and her assistant include information about student loan repayment in new-student orientations. As part of the enrollment process, students are advised of their loan amounts, repayment terms and their loan repayment responsibilities. The financial aid staff sends monthly reminder letters - supplemented by e-mails and phone calls - to former students who are behind in their loan payments. As a result, the default rate for CCA declined to 7.3 percent for the most recent year for which final figures are available, down from 17.6 percent in 2003. During this same period, student completion rates for all campuses increased between 8 percent and 10 percent.
Career Technical Institute - This Washington, D.C., technical school prepares students for careers in office administration, health care services and information technology. CTI's debt management program incorporates intermediate loan counseling with required entrance and exit counseling, life skills training and borrower contact. The school uses USA Funds Debt Manager® to send communications to its student loan borrowers. CTI sends bimonthly student loan repayment reminders to recent graduates and withdrawn students. Former students who are 90 days or more past due in their student loan payments receive weekly calls and letters from the school. If borrowers fall 200 days or more behind in their payments, CTI sends them color-coded letters stressing the urgency of resolving their loan payment issues. Based on a projected increase in its default rate, CTI changed the format and frequency of its borrower communications. As a result, it has posted a draft 2007 cohort default rate of 9.6 percent, down from a final default rate of 12.4 percent in 2006.
Hawaii Pacific University - The largest private university in Hawaii serves a culturally and geographically diverse student body. The director of student loans in the university's financial aid office is largely responsible for the school's debt management initiative. She uses USA Funds Debt Manager to send letters and make phone calls to former students with student loan payment problems. The university also uses USA Funds Loan Counselor® to advise its student loan borrowers of their loan terms, rights and responsibilities. The school is exploring an expanded use of USA Funds' financial literacy program, USA Funds Life Skills®, to help first-year students transition from high school to college. The university's most recent final cohort default rate was 2.4 percent.
University of Hawaii at Hilo - This campus of the state university system has experienced a 31 percent increase in enrollment since 2001. Using financial literacy materials from USA Funds Life Skills, members of the financial aid staff work with faculty members to deliver workshops to freshmen on money management, budgeting, and student loan and credit card debt. The university provides loan counseling in a variety of formats, including Web-based, group advising and by individual appointment, and has been updating students on their current student loan debt levels with each new financial aid award notice. Its exit counseling materials include a detailed summary of each student's loans. UH Hilo also uses USA Funds Debt Manager to generate loan payment reminder letters to former students during their student loan grace periods and to send letters and make phone calls to borrowers with past-due student loans. These activities have cut the university's most recent student loan default rate to 3.2 percent, from a rate of 7.9 percent for 2001-2002.
"The debt management practices of these four institutions exemplify the best efforts of postsecondary institutions nationwide to promote responsible borrowing and to help former students successfully repay their student loans," said Denise B. Feser, USA Funds senior vice president, customer relations.
USA Funds Excellence in Debt Management Awards are presented annually to highlight outstanding campus debt management programs and to disseminate to other postsecondary institutions best practices in debt management and student loan default prevention.
USA Funds staff and representatives of schools that received debt management excellence awards in 2008 selected this year's recipients.
Headquartered in Indianapolis, USA Funds is a nonprofit corporation that works to enhance postsecondary education preparedness, access and success by providing and supporting financial and other valued services. For more information about USA Funds, visit www.usafunds.org.
Posted 07/01/09 to www.NASFAA.org. Posting of press releases is done as a service to Members and does not imply endorsement or support by NASFAA. NASFAA does not review this information for content or accuracy.
