This report examines how predatory for-profit institutions are geographically targeting communities of color in cities in the Upper Midwest and across the country. By targeting prospective Black and Latino students with dubious educational programs and high levels of debt, the report shows how...

This report is the result of an investigation revealing that public colleges and universities nationwide are driving students toward expensive, predatory student debt. The report highlights how this practice is particularly prevalent at short-term, non-degree granting “bootcamp” programs,...

With more than $1.7 trillion dollars in outstanding balances, student loan debt is the second largest class of consumer credit in the country, and it is rapidly growing. This crisis is fueled by a broken debt-financed higher education system that punishes borrowers for pursuing the American...

There is a little-discussed type of student debt hanging over the heads of millions of Americans. These debts often come in small amounts. A few hundred here. A few thousand there. These are debts that students and former students owe directly to their schools, for everything from unpaid library...

The Student Borrower Protection Center and Credit Builders Alliance examined how borrowers with different levels of student debt repay common financial products—credit cards, mortgages, and auto loans—to determine the added cost to each borrower for owing student loans. Specifically, this...

Today, borrowers in courtrooms across the country are being sued for faulty or unsubstantiated private student loan debt. This is because predatory creditors are abusing the court system and intimidating people to pay debts they do not owe. The following report from the SBPC, the Maryland...

Alternative data, or information such as cell phone payments or utility bills, is increasingly used in underwriting by the financial services industry, especially financial technology or “fintech” companies. Some financial companies have begun to use information about borrowers’ education...

In this case, the Montana Supreme Court is considering an appeal by student loan borrower and public defender James Reavis, who filed a complaint in Montana court to seek redress after PHEAA miscounted his student loan payments made in an effort to qualify for PSLF. These claims are similar to...

In 2018, Kentucky Attorney General Beshear began investigating the servicing of student loans owned by the National Collegiate Student Loan Trusts (NCSLT). These Trusts are notorious for shoddy record-keeping, meaning that servicers and collectors pursue borrowers for debt that they can’t...

This report examines the history of Income-Driven Repayment (IDR), identifies its key founding principles, the ways that policymakers have tried to meet them, and how the current design of the protection has fallen short of achieving its original goals. As a way to relieve the financial burden...