Dr. Robert Kelchen, an assistant professor of higher education at Seton Hall University, said the Demos report is timely given that the U.S. Senate has recently begun hearings on reauthorizing the Higher Education Act. “In terms of policy, we’re at a good time to think about big picture policies. … And it’s worth thinking about either adding more money in terms of grant aid and, if that’s not feasible, then thinking about how to make the loan system work better for students,” he said.
Kelchen added that some research has been done by his colleagues and him looking at the differential impacts of student loan debt. “And what we’ve done is we’ve looked at wealth differences by race/ethnicity, and there are enormous differences in household wealth, particularly after the Great Recession, which disproportionately hit minority families. And so that In part explains the need to borrow. But there is still a percentage of students who need money for college but are unwilling to borrow,” he said.
Dr. Christopher Nellum, a senior policy analyst with the American Council on Education’s Center for Policy Research & Strategy, said he believes that, as the Higher Education Act reauthorization brings new attention to student financial aid as a national issue, the Demos report should help generate attention on the role of declining state higher education investment, which has been a factor driving student indebtedness.
“I do think this report hopefully will get not only our senators and congressmen to think about this issue—the issue being state investment in higher education—but getting states to think about what they’re doing and what their responsibility is to higher education,” Nellum said.
Access to The Debt Divide can be found here.
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