| Running for the economic empathizer in chief
Clinton laid out a list of college loan assistance, mortgage relief, heating oil assistance and more. But people who said they would vote for her today focused less on the specifics than on a prospect of a return to the booming economy presided over by her husband in the 1990s.
Obama supporters embraced his message that real economic reform can occur only under the guidance of someone capable of breaking the partisan logjam in Washington.
Fighting for attention, trailing in the polls, Edwards hammered home his message of economic populism, which he has stuck to more than any of the others since the start of the race.
Bill Clinton, running for president in 1992 as a relatively obscure Southern governor, set himself apart with his ability to show empathy to working-class Americans locked in the throes of a recession.
Bowdoin to replace all loans with grants
College graduation is often associated with freedom. But with tuition costs at an all-time high, Bowdoin graduates often find themselves shackled by student loan debt years after receiving their degrees. No more. The College announced last week that it will replace all its loans with permanent grants beginning in the fall in an attempt to ease the amount of money students owe when they graduate. "The student loan burden that we have imposed on studentsthat has grown over the last 10 yearsis at a level that makes it very difficult for students at the College while they're here," said President Barry Mills in an online video released with the announcement. "It makes it very difficult for them as they think about their career options for the future." Tuition and fees totaled $46,260 this yearalmost $20,000 more than they did a decade ago.
Mo. student loan agency forgives loans for 510 teachers
Those covered in this most recent effort have federal Stafford loans and are either first-year teachers or provisionally certified to teach math, science or special education.
MOHELA, over the next two years, also plans to forgive many Stafford loans for engineering and pre-engineering students who live in Missouri.
Gov. Matt Blunt has used more than $300 million from the loan authority to pay for college construction projects. ©2008 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. .
A Financial-Aid Bias?
The financial-aid determination process is pretty much a black box. You put your data in, whether on the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) form handled by the U.S. Education Department or the College Scholarship Service (CSS) form processed by the College Board, send along last year's tax forms and out the other end come scholarship and loan packages from the colleges that have accepted your child. How those numbers are determined is up to each school's own financial-aid office. But there's a surprising degree of sameness in the way these offices operate and in the lack of explanation they provide to parents. And it's no wonder they look so similar: They are all using the same playbook. The College Board, a membership organization of most colleges and universities in the country, claims it doesn't tell schools how to evaluate financial need.
|
