Negotiating on the Title IV Loans Negotiated Rulemaking Committee

I am very honored to write that I have been selected to be the primary non-federal negotiator representing financial aid administrators for the Title IV Loans Negotiated Rulemaking Committee. California and WASFAA are well represented on the committee. The first meeting starts next week in Washington DC.

I will be sharing what I can through Twitter and the CASFAA newsletter. Hopefully, my first tweet will not be next to a pile of snow.

Now for the ask.

I really want to hear from people in the financial aid profession. What do you want to see negotiated in the loan programs? Send me an email scott (a) scottcline.org or a tweet with your thoughts and ideas.

The missed argument in merit- and need-based institutional aid

From Sunday’s NY Times “Freebies for the Rich”:

Raising the tuition and then offering a 25 percent scholarship to four wealthier kids who might otherwise have gone to private school generates more revenue than giving a free ride to one who truly needs it.

The problem with this sentence and nearly every time this argument is made is the author forgets to insert the line “…school generates more revenue to provide a free ride to one who truly needs it.”

For some reason the argument over merit- versus need-based hinges on zero-sum game, instead of seeing it as a pie enlarging equation.[1]

Every college or university with enough level of equity, mission and values would have a school full of talented low-income students, but unless the federal government, state government, endowment or other revenue producing source is paying for it, it is simply not possible.[2]

As state governments continue to reduce educational funding, institutions have been forced to find those offset revenues to pay for the low-income students.

Make no doubt about it, this trend is a reaction to those reductions and this reaction has both intended and unintended consequences.

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1. Yes, there are many nuances to this, especially in the area of public universities with fixed enrollment numbers, but stick with me for a few seconds.  ↩

2. One of the most recent stories about other revenue producing sources failing a school is Cooper Union, which until this school year, was 100% tuition free.  ↩

WCET Submitted Testimony to Department of Education →

If you have not already had a chance read Russell Poulin’s submitted testimony for WCET to the Department of Education for Negotiated Rule Making, it gives a good overview of the conversation points (as well as WICHE’s stance) at the Department of Education Hearing back on May 30th at UCSF.

You can also see my mediocre iPhone photography of him delivering testimony.

Why here and now? FAFSA 2014-15

The Department of Education annouced this past Tuesday that starting with the 2014-15 FAFSA, it will become more inclusive of families where both parents live in the same household, including gay parents.

This sounds wonderful and even while the Department of Education is playing the dance of DOMA, it has left me with more questions about intention, purpose, and timing.

@Daniel_Luzer at the Washington Monthly struct my thinking:

But well, progressive token gestures are easier than substantive policy fixes.

via @jstnchsbrwn

Study: A Revealed Preference Ranking of U.S. Colleges and Universities

A study by Avery, Glickman, Hoxby and Metrick proposes a new ranking system for U.S. colleges and universities based on student preference. They suggest in the study that their ranking system is not effected by financial aid.

Our ranking is...similar regardless of whether we control for variables, such as net cost, that vary among a college’s admits

They used Net Price of a college in order to determine if it had any impact on student decision making process. The issue with Net Price is it is an average--it does not begin to tell the story. No one has linked it to decision making of individual students. A student who goes to a school with a Net Price of $30,000 (on the very high side) and has a full ride (effective net price of $0) is making different decisions--economically.

College Net Price might get students in the door, but it does not make the sale.

For a full news article on the study see @erichoov at the Chronicle of Higher Ed.