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The College Board. For more than six decades, the College Board has been a leader and innovator in financial aid. College Board’s fully integrated financial aid solutions are designed to help your institution develop equitable, effective, and efficient financial aid policies and processes. Visit us at collegeboard.org. 

Doug Severs, who is now the director of financial aid and scholarships at Oregon State University, began working in the financial aid office at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in the summer of 1973, just after he finished his undergraduate degree, and not many years after former President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Higher Education Act of 1965 into law. But many things have changed since then.

Learn the answer to this question and learn how to instantly find credible and reliable solutions to your most pressing regulatory and compliance questions with NASFAA's AskRegs Knowledgebase. The Knowledgebase guide and video tutorials highlight the many features of this tool.

Whether you’re the financial aid director or an understudy rehearsing for the leading role, "You’re the Director: A Guide to Leadership in Student Financial Aid (2nd edition)" can help. This book is a must-have for new and aspiring financial aid professionals, as well as for seasoned financial aid directors seeking to improve their leadership skills. Order your copy today.

NASFAA is here to help you stay up to date on the top policy events occurring throughout the week in Washington, D.C. and, when applicable, across the country. Make sure to check back in to Today's News each morning for coverage of some of the events, and email us at [email protected] if you're aware of upcoming policy events that could be of interest to the financial aid community.

Congress:
The House is in session Monday through Wednesday. The Senate is in session Monday through Friday.

Tuesday:

• Negotiated Rulemaking Committee Meeting for Borrower Defense, 9:00 am to 5:00 pm ET
• State of the Union Address, 9:00 pm ET

Wednesday:

• Negotiated Rulemaking Committee Meeting for Borrower Defense, 9:00 am to 5:00 pm ET

Thursday:

• Negotiated Rulemaking Committee Meeting for Borrower Defense, 9:00 am to 5:00 pm ET

The COD Processing Update provides information related to COD System processing and includes the following sections: COD News and Updates, Current Issues (with a subsection for All Programs, Direct Loans, and Grants), and Reminders.

The Department would like to inform the community of a Federal Student Aid e-mail notification campaign to encourage students and parents who do not yet have an FSA ID to create their FSA ID in advance of the January 1, 2016 availability of the 2016-2017 Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA^®).

This document provides notice of the computer matching program between the U.S. Department of Education (ED) and the Social Security Administration (SSA).

"Although the new kid in town is causing a commotion, let’s not forget all about who was here first," The Chronicle of Higher Education reports. "At the College Board’s annual forum here this week, admissions officials and college counselors have discussed — and dissected — the Coalition for Access, Affordability, and Success’s controversial plans for a new application system, still under construction."

"College accreditors are facing scrutiny on yet another front in Washington," Inside Higher Ed reports. "As the Obama administration announces a set of executive actions and proposed legislative steps to toughen its oversight of the agencies, a U.S. Senate investigative committee has opened a sweeping inquiry into higher education accreditation, and lawmakers have started requesting records of individual accrediting agencies, according to several people familiar with the review."

"Fifty years ago this month, President Lyndon B. Johnson stood in the gymnasium of Texas State University, his alma mater, and signed a landmark piece of legislation that he said would 'swing open a new door for the young people of America,'" according to U.S. News & World Report. "But even today the door to higher education still remains closed for millions of students, despite all the Higher Education Act did to level the playing field."

"During an appearance at St. Anselm College in Manchester, N.H., on Wednesday, GOP presidential candidate Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) said taking out a student loan is worse than indentured servitude," CNSNews reports.

"As the nation’s largest charter school chain, the Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP) has built a reputation for its success preparing low-income, minority students for college. But how many of its students persevere to college graduation?" according to The Hechinger Report.

"For nearly two decades the College Board has been publishing annual statistics on both the price of college and the aid that students receive. They run the gamut of higher education finance, measuring everything from military and veterans tuition programs, state financial aid programs, and of course, federal student aid. They have also provided one of the only estimates of federal tuition tax benefits, until now," according to New America's EdCentral blog.

"The U.S. Department of Education just released yet another student loan repayment plan based on the borrower’s income, the Revised Pay-As-You-Earn Repayment Plan (REPAYER). The details of the new repayment plan are so complicated that it will be difficult for borrowers to calculate the monthly payment and compare it with the other three income-driven repayment plans," Mark Kantrowitz writes in The Washington Post's Answer Sheet blog.

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