Having unexpectedly found itself handing off the baton to a Republican administration in January, the U.S. Department of Education is racing to finish a slate of Obama administration priorities. But few of the department's remaining tasks are as daunting as processing thousands of debt-relief claims filed by former students of closed for-profit colleges.
Since the closure of Corinthian Colleges in 2015, the department has received tens of thousands of such applications to have loans discharged under a previously little-used borrower defense statute.
Now with the Obama administration on the way out, activist groups and borrowers are pressuring the department to move faster on a process that can drag on for months. Handing over pending claims to the next administration would risk the chances of those borrowers having loans discharged, they argue.
Read more at Inside Higher Ed: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2016/12/14/activists-and-borrowers-call-obama-administration-provide-debt-relief-defrauded