Great News from Sen. Don McEachin

One of the more interesting aspects of the blogosphere is that it often times let’s you hear directly from elected officials. We got a prime example of that today when Sen. Don McEachin wrote a guest post over at Not Larry Sabato which describes how a cost of a four year degree can easily cost $50,000 or more — even if you’re paying in-state tuition at a public school. He then goes onto mention how many Virginians are forced to take out loans in order to help pay for their higher education. Unfortunately, he also points out that many of these companies have been involved in recent scandals.

Over the past year, I have been particularly disheartened to hear of the unethical and irregular behavior engaged in by some of the student loan corporations. Contrary to what many people think, many student loan programs are for profit corporations. In their eagerness to earn dollars, some unsettling practices have emerged. One of the largest, if not the largest, student loan corporation is Sallie Mae which has been in the news recently because of some of its alleged very questionable practices in its search for increasing profit.

Some schools of higher education have reportedly entered into a relationship with Sallie Mae, where the corporation planted unidentified employees inside school financial aid offices. They also allegedly wined and dined university financial aid officers to further encourage them to entice students to borrow from Sallie Mae.

This is where we get to the point of McEachin’s guest post. McEachin and Senator Chap Petersen introduced a bill that would attempt to protect students from the unethical behavior coming from some of the student loan companies.

Because I believe that the opportunity to get a college degree is very critical and because I was so discouraged and dismayed by these egregious lending practices, Senator Chap Petersen and I introduced a bill this year to protect our students and their families. This bill requires institutions of higher education to develop procedures about disclosing financial aid policies and report this information on an annual basis to the State Council of Higher Education for oversight. The information in the disclosure must include the status of any private lenders being used by that school, the criteria that determine which lenders, if any, are recommended to students by the university and explicit information that students can actually borrow from any lender of their choice. Finally, this bill forbids any college or university from having an exclusive relationship with a lender and also prohibits employees of the school from accepting gifts from lenders.

I strongly believe that one of the more important issues facing our great Commonwealth today is the ever increasing costs of a higher education. In today’s economy, most Virginians need to have at least an undergraduate level education if they hope to get a well paying job. I am therefore glad to see that Senators Petersen and McEachin have taken a step in the direction of making a college education more affordable.

It should also be noted that this bill has now passed in both the Senate and the House of Delegates. As Sen. McEachin pointed out in his post, it is now simply waiting for Governor Kaine to sign it into law. I imagine the Governor will realize the importance of this bill and will be signing it into law in the near future.