News You Need to Know: Daily Roundup, Fri., Sept. 29th

House Passes New Restriction on Eligible Lender Trustees

The U.S. House of Representatives passed a third short-term extension bill for the Higher Education Act on Thursday that includes a provision placing new restrictions on college-bank partnerships. In January 2006, Congress stopped allowing colleges to garner directly a portion of federal subsidy payments associated with student loans. They left a loophole, though "eligible lender trustee" arrangements. An "eligible-lender-trustee" arrangement involves a college hiring a bank to act as a trustee for Federal Family Education Loans (FFEL) that the relevant college makes to its own students. To date, institutions of higher education that use these arrangements have not been required to put profits associated with the loans toward need-based financial aid. The extender bill, they will.

MOHELA: Lawmakers Disagree on Student Loan Sale for College Construction Plan

Missouri lawmakers are voicing different views on the next steps for the MOHELA deal. Some believe that a change in state law may be necessary that details MOHELAs mission and specifies that MOHELAs revenue can finance projects other than student loans, such as college construction. Others believe that a simple resolution will be sufficient, which would allow the plan to move forward more quickly. Universities have also been posing questions about how the money will be allocated, and some lawmakers think that an appropriations bill will need to be included in the deal.

UCLA Adopts "Holistic" Admissions Review

UCLA announced yesterday that it will be changing its admissions process to include a more "holistic" method of reviewing applications. Three faculty panels endorsed the plan this week, which allows individual admissions officers to review applicants files as a whole instead of reviewing specific academic or personal areas in isolation. UCLA officials said the change was sought after statistics were released last June showing that only 2% of the current freshman class is African-American. UCLA will have to continue to abide by Californias Proposition 209, which prohibits state universities from considering race as a factor in the admissions process. Officials are not predicting what the impact will be on the racial composition of the class, but they believe that the holistic process will be fairer, because academic achievements can now be considered in a "personal" context.