Featured Student Loan Debt Forgiveness Member - Help my friend Gail!

Gail is a strong supporter and reliable volunteer for the Forgive Student Loan Debt Movement. She's the featured member this week, and I want to give thank her for her dedication and continued help. It's members like her who inspire me to continue fighting the good fight.

C: Where did you go to school?

G: International Academy of Design & Technology (IADT), Tampa Florida.

C: Why did you pursue the degree(s) you have now or will soon have?

G:  I have worked in a field that I fell into at a young age, and I was never happy in, and worked at least 1 often 2 jobs for many years to survive. With my kids grown and gone I decided to pursue the education and career that I had always had a passion for and a talent in. I now have a BFA in Interior Design. I graduated Summa Cum Laude in 2006. Since graduating I have only worked 18 months due to lay offs and never made more than 28k per year.

C: What is your day-to-day life like as a result of your student loan debt?

G: I wake up to the Sallie Mae alarm clock. They call faithfully at 8:10 am every day. They tell me how many days delinquent I am and I tell them I am still unemployed and broke just like yesterday.I then spend about 4 hours on the computer searching for and applying for jobs. I can't afford to visit anyone due to gas prices and my limited income., so I rarely leave the house. I write letters to government officials and read Cryn's blog and Robert's every day, along with other articles posted by the FSLDM.

C: Do you regret going to school?

G: I do not regret it. I loved school and studied and worked very hard. I enjoyed being in school again, especially for something I am so passionate about. However, I do regret going to the school I went . . . I feel there are probably less expensive alternatives in schools that actually deliver on their promises. 

C: What do you have to offer an organization/company, and why should they hire you?

G: I have a lot of experience in multiple aspects of the design world. I can perform at an above average level in, but not limited to, the following areas: budget/bookeeping, project coordinator [roles], furniture design, space planning, AutoCad and sales. I am also willing to travel anytime. I would be an asset to any firm because I can wear so many "hats" and always give 110%.

C: Why are you a supporter of the Forgive Student Loan Debt Movement, i.e., what drew you to it the most?

G: I support FSLDM because they give me hope that there is still a small glimmer of light that I may actually get through this bone-crushing debt through forgiveness!

C: If you could meet with President Obama and discuss your student loan debt situation, what would you discuss? 

G: I would like to ask 2 questions:

1.When is the government going to get out of bed with Sallie Mae and NelNet and start protecting the educated poor of this country.

2. The President has constantly pushed for moms to go back to school, get an education and now that we have, we are unemployed, broke and have the most unbelievable debt . . . . What do you suggest we do now?

 

If you would like to be featured on Education Matters, please email me at ccrynjohannsen@gmail.com. 

 

Call to Action - We want YOU! Please go and post to support Dr. Oberg

A few posters who responded to the lawsuit filed by Dr. Jon Oberg are saying he's done it for his own selfish interests and referring to him derisively as a "whistleblower." He was in fact a researcher who discovered some serious loopholes that allowed lenders like Nelnet and Sallie Mae to rob the treasury of billions of dollars - OUR tax dollars!

Please, please go and post here to support Dr. Oberg. He was, and is, a courageous man - he's on our side and has always been an advocate for students.

Thanks for your help! It will only take a few minutes to set up an account and share your support!

Part II of the Resurrection of the Dept. of Ed. G-man and America's Collective Trauma

The archival dust from the binary system operating behind this clean-looking computer has settled. With the dust particles settling into their cozy crevices, additional clarity about Oberg's heroism as a civil servant at the DOE emerges.

On a side note, but nevertheless important, one reader pointed out that the story I've told so far skewers Republicans, and therefore might imply that I believe the Democrats are not involved in this mess. That's far from the case. This student lending crisis is a systemic problem. Its center, sadly, reveals the darker side of politics, universities, and very powerful lobbying groups. All groups know how to mobilize with great efficiency. Operating around the vortex of money and power, their mobilization efforts have sucked in a slew of unfortunate victims: working- and middle-class students and their families. Those who graduate now know that they are a new class - the educated indentured class.

Luckily, Oberg was not sucked into the structure of misinformation. As a result of seeing things clearly, he uncovered a gaping hole that allowed lenders to take millions of dollars in subsidies and line their own pockets.

Case in point: Sallie Mae's CEO, Albert Lord, made a pretty penny. Here, for example, Jeffrey H. Birnbaum wrote an article in the Washington Post in 2007 and rhetorically asked, "How much wealth [did Lord acquire as a CEO]?"

Answer:" Lord, 61, has been building his own private 18-hole golf course on 244 acres in Anne Arundel County, an hour's drive from downtown Washington. He was well-heeled enough to spearhead a serious-but-unsuccessful bid to purchase the District's new professional baseball team, the Nationals."

(Question is: did he finish that private golf course and should he acquire more land in Anne Arundel County? 244 acres - isn't that a small spread? I worry that he might not be making enough money to survive. I also worry that Lord might be suffering from his own personal trauma, and has frantically been building things for leisure to escape the nasty skeletons in his own childhood closet).

The dutiful civil servant, Oberg, worried about the loophole(s). He couldn't stop worrying about it. The slumber induced by collective trauma did not make Oberg drowsy. There's also another issue to digest. It's related to the 9.5% return on loans. however, this type of awakening and the lessons we are all learning about this corrupted system means that I will provide this piece of the story later. If you want to read about it now and are prepared, go to the original blog I'm referencing here. Rest assured, the 9.5% issue will be covered.

Returning to the hula hoops loopholes that the lenders slithered and continue to slither through, it turns out that Nelnet benefited too. And so the treasury was feeding Nelnet and Sallie Mae with millions and millions of dollars. Indeed, these were hungry, hungry student-lending-pythons. In fact, an audit review, which was finally carried out (years after Oberg discovered the problem) showed that the department needed to recover $278 million dollars from Nelnet.
The money was not recovered. Nelnet agreed to the blockage of the subsidies. End of that leakage-story. Right? No. They continued to find loopholes and managed to slither through.

Oberg didn't like that. He was doing his job, and yet was being told not to. Congress tried to take care of the other subsidies that allowed the lenders to fatten themselves up (pythons are hungry creatures). In 1997 the Clinton Administration tried to cut off all subsidies and end this systemic problem.

At that juncture in his career, Oberg was an Educational liaison to Congress. He approached Sally Stroup about this legislation. At the time Stroup was acting as senior aide to the Republican chairman of the House education committee.

Oberg speaks of their meeting, 'Sally told me there was no way that language was coming out. . . . She didn't give me a reason -- just forget it.' Sally, who was clearly acting as an advocate for students, went onward and upward in politics. She became an assistant secretary of education in the Bush administration.

Bite that off, digest it, and come back for some more later . . .