Dive Brief:
- The U.S. Department of Education has announced its intention to create a rulemaking committee to clarify the process through which student borrowers who believe their higher education institutions have defrauded them can have their debt forgiven.
- The department will accept public comment through mid-September, a period in which it will also hold two public hearings.
- In announcing the intent, the department said a committee will be established following the public hearings and will negotiate the rules over the course of three, three-day meetings in the winter of 2016.
Dive Insight:
The Department of Education’s debt forgiveness process was little-used until Corinthian College’s collapse. Now it is becoming a more common avenue for students who attended now-closed schools to leave their student loans behind, but it has been criticized as a complicated and overly narrow option. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has said the rulemaking negotiation process should create “a clearer, more comprehensive system to assist students who believe they were defrauded by their college.” It is also expected to create a new system of accountability for schools whose students succeed in getting their loans discharged.