Office of Financial Aid

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Week of October 11th, 2010

Loan Repayment and Personal Budgeting Workshop

Are you worried about your student loans and debt? If so, you’re probably not alone! You’re making an important investment in yourself. It’s also important that you be able to achieve your financial goals (including repayment of your student loans) once you graduate. Do you have all the financial skills needed to do so? Having a better understanding of money management and personal finance can help you maximize your educational investment and minimize your debt. With this in mind, our office will be hosting a workshop about loan repayment and person budgeting. The workshop is open to all students and alumni. During this interactive seminar, we will focus on:

Budget planning and money management strategies that work
Developing and maintaining good credit
Wise borrowing habits

The session will be held as follows:

Wednesday, October 27th, 6:00 PM - 7:00 PM, Room C25

Thursday, October 28th, 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM, Room 580

2010-2011 Financial Aid Instructions

In past academic years, the Illinois Institute of Technology participated in the Federal Family Education Loan Program (FFELP). FFELP allows students to borrow federal student loans from private lenders (usually banks or credit unions). On March 30, 2010, the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010 was signed into law. This law includes a provision that eliminates the Federal Family Education Loan Program (FFELP) beginning July 1, 2010. For this reason, beginning in the fall semester of 2010 all Title IV eligible higher education institutions, including IIT, are required to participate in the Direct Loan Program (DL). The Direct Loan Program is a federal student loan program that allows students to borrow funds “directly” from the U.S. Department of Education. DL Subsidized Stafford, Unsubsidized Stafford and Graduate PLUS loans operate in essentially the same manner as in the FFEL program. Students receive the same fixed interest rates (except the Graduate PLUS has a lower interest rate at 7.9%) and have similar repayment options. Payments made by the borrower are sent directly to the U.S. Department of Education’s servicing company.

Because of this change, all students who borrowed loans in 2009-2010 and plan on borrowing federal loans in 2010-2011 will need to complete new Federal Direct Loan Master Promissory Note(s) (MPN) and Federal Direct Loan Entrance Counseling. If you wish to receive loan funds for the 2010-2011 academic year, you must do the following:

Complete your 2010-2011 FAFSA if you have not already done so. It can take up to 2 weeks to receive a financial aid award notification once your FAFSA is complete.
Log on to the myIIT portal to view your financial aid award.
Complete the Estimated Cost Worksheet. This form helps you determine the amount of Graduate Plus or Stafford loan funds you will need to accept in order to meet your expenses for the academic year.
Accept the amounts of Federal Direct Stafford and Federal Direct Graduate PLUS loans that you would like to receive via the myIIT portal. It is to your advantage to accept the maximum Subsidized and Unsubsidized Stafford loan before you accept the Federal Direct Graduate PLUS loan. Please refer to the Financial Aid Guide on the Chicago-Kent financial aid website for the different types of Federal loans that are available.
Complete a Federal Direct Loan Promissory Note for the corresponding loans that you have accepted. Only one promissory note is needed for both the Subsidized and Unsubsidized Stafford Loan.
Complete the online Federal Direct Loan Entrance Counseling.
The link to complete the Master Promissory Note(s) and online Entrance Counseling are located at http://www.kentlaw.edu/depts/finaid/DLforms.html

Free Credit Report

Did you know that you are now able to receive a free credit report once every 12 months? We encourage students to review their credit reports annually to check for inaccuracies and identify any suspicious activity.

To receive your free credit report, please visit the following link: http://www.annualcreditreport.com. This central site allows you to request a free credit file disclosure, commonly called a credit report, once every 12 months from each of the nationwide consumer credit reporting companies: Equifax, Experian and TransUnion.

Please be aware that other sites may advertise free credit reports, but this is the only site that is sponsored by the federal government and the three nationwide credit reporting agencies. Other sites may charge fees.