In the summer of 2022, New America managed focus groups with almost 50 borrowers from across the country who reported holding federal student debt and defaulting on their loans before the COVID-19 pandemic. Focus group participants felt hopeless about their student loans, and they had good reason to feel this way. They entered the default system,…

Between the 2008-09 and 2016-17 school years, over 300 degree-granting higher education institutions in the United States have closed their doors. An overwhelming majority of these recently closed institutions are for-profit colleges, which often serve a population of disproportionately low-income students receiving Pell Grants and federal loans.…

This paper provides a brief overview of the current state of federal accountability and the need for change, and a summary of the landscape of state accountability reforms through funding structures for public colleges and universities. It explores key questions or decision points that must be addressed in designing a federal accountability system…

For all the attention student loans have received in the media and from policymakers in recent years, there is still remarkably little information on why and how borrowers struggle to repay them. Rising college prices and debt levels explain some of the troubles borrowers have with their loans, as does a slow economic recovery that has caused…