University of Kansas - Jayhawker Yearbook (Lawrence, KS)

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any economists and Wall Street investors said the S700 billion eco- nomic recovery package was essential to prevent- ing world markets from slipping into a long-term recession, but what does it mean for student loans? The bailout should bring down interest rates on private student loans and increase their avail- . ability, said Mark Kan- trowitz, president of MK 3 ' ' 5 I Consulting, a national i I i htm that provides student I Financial aid consulting services. He said the bail- out will have no effect on Federal Stafford Loans or consolidation loans. Kantrowitz said the S700 billion injection should free up credit for lenders so they can issue more private loans. The in- terest rates on these loans, which Kantrowitz said would have risen by at least 2 percent had Congress not passed the bailout, could start coming down, he said. The bailout won't affect federal loans because they are guaranteed by the government. O8 - O9 l JAYHAWKER WHAT THE BAILO UT M EANS FORSTUDENT LCJANS Students will continue to have a difficult time consolidating their student-loan debt into one monthly payment. Many lenders have suspended their consolida- tion services, which Kantrowitz said were unprontable for lenders. According to FinAid.org, 85.6 percent of the consolidation loan industry has left the market since the subprime mortgage meltdown Hrst made headlines in August 2007. Consolidation loans won't see any fixes anytime soon,', Kantrowitz said. Lenders lose money every time they make them because they are still underwater. Although this is good news for students who need to borrow more than the government will lend them Q53 1,000 for financially dependent students, 557,500 for financially independent students for their entire college careerl, it doesn't help students such as Curry Curtis, who borrowed from multiple sources and will have a difficult time finding lenders willing to consolidate her debts into one monthly payment. Curtis, Olathe senior, said she borrowed 527,500 through the KU financial aid department, 558,000 through KU Endowment and a 82,300 federal loan through Wachovia, a private lender. Curtis said that she would have liked to consolidate all three loans into one, but that she understood she would probably end up having to pay back all three debts separately. I know it'll be hard, but I still plan on trying to find a way to consolidate them when I get out,,' Curtis said. It,ll be really annoying paying them all back individually every month. 'I Although students will likely find it easier to get ap- proved for private loans, Kantrowitz said, students should exhaust all other financial options first. Private loans come with higher interest rates than Federal Stafford Loans, and they are usually unsubsi- dized, which means debt starts accumulating while the student is still in college. The interest rates on private loans are about 1 1 per- cent, according to FinAid.org. Kantrowitz said the bailout should bring them down to about 9 percent, which is still higher than the rates on federal loans. Robert Baker, Lawrence credit counselor for the Housing and Credit Counseling Institute, said students should plan far in advance before borrowing money to finance their educations. As with all decisions requiring a large expenditure of resources, careful planning and a judicious gathering of information and options will save a potential college student money, Baker said in an e-mail. The choices a student makes in advance and the amount of time a stu- dent has to review options and make good choices could impact the overall cost of college or debt repayment for the next decade or so. I' Kantrowitz said a student's top priority when decid- ing how to pay for college should be to minimize debt wherever possible.

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ROUP ENCOURAGES BARS TO RECYCLE I I if BAR RECYCLING G LASS ne chilly Saturday morning in Febru- ary, Andrew Stanley and fellow students took 145 pounds of glass to be recycled at the 12th and Haskell Bargain Center. All 145 pounds came from Wilde's Chateau 24 and were the result of one Friday night of business. wfhat would all have been thrown away without usf' Stanley said. L'And that's just one night. Stanley, Overland Park senior, is president of Students for Bar Recycling, in its Hrst 'factive semestern since starting up in Decem- ber, Stanley said. During start-up efforts, Stanley said he estimated group mem- bers called BO bars around Lawrence and asked them if they recycled glass. None ofthem did. uThey just said no and didn't want to say much after that,', Stanley said. They said that it was just a pain, basically. a' Kate Wasserman, Flower Mound, Texas, senior and vice president of SBR, said glass recycling was the group's main focus. Wasserman said the group was trying to be a source of information for bars. 'LWe donat have the resources in group membership and money to help bars have the resources to do that,,' Wasserman said. 'QSO we're mainly just trying to get bars connected with recycling companiesf, Stanley said it wasn't likely the glass pickup service would happen every night, but he said most bars in Law- rence would use the service no more than four days each week. At that rate, Stanley said it would probably cost a bar about 351,200 each year for the recycling service. Scafe said many bars didn't want to deal with the logistics of storing glass, working out pickups and train- ing staff to make sure everything was placed in the correct containers. 'SThere's not much ofa Hnancial incentive for bars to recycle,', Scafe said. But having said that, I think that if they advertised that they recycled, that will bring in a certain clientele. Stanley said one way the group would afhliate itself with the bar would be by displaying its logo in the bar window. lt would signal to customers that the bar was a Mgreenn bar. Stanley said he hoped an incentive like this would generate competitive momentum for other bars to join the network. Stanley also said when enough bars signed on he hoped to get exposure for the bars by organizing green pub-crawls. ul really think this is an issue students care about, ', Stanley said. It's a chance for them to show the Lawrence community that they're committed to recycling. U Wasserman said she hoped businesses would have a better incentive to recycle glass. f'I've always felt that recycling is one ofthe easiest and smallest ways we can all do our partf' Wasserman said.