The Biden administration announced this week yet another round of federal student loan forgiveness. More than 150,000 people stand to benefit from the roughly $4.2 billion in loan cancellation, which comes days before President Joe Biden leaves office.
Here’s who qualifies for the relief.
Students from schools that misled them
Nearly 85,000 people will get their federal student debt forgiven through the U.S. Department of Education’s Borrower Defense Loan Discharge program. People may be eligible for the option if their school closed while they were enrolled or if they were misled by their school or didn’t receive a quality education.
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The Education Department said it had approved group discharges for 73,600 students who attended schools owned by the Center for Excellence in Higher Education, including Independence University and California College San Diego. The $1.15 billion in debt forgiveness will go to borrowers who attended these institutions between Jan. 1, 2006 and Aug. 1, 2021, the Education Department said.
Another 11,000 borrowers will get their student debt canceled if they attended any location of Drake College of Business between Jan. 1, 2008 and July 31, 2015, when the school closed. That debt cancellation totals $107 million.
Lastly, 280 borrowers who enrolled in the Criminal Justice Program at Lincoln Technical Institute’s campus in Lowell, Massachusetts, between 2010 and 2012, or the Somerville, Massachusetts, campus from 2010 to 2013, will have their federal student debt cleared. These borrowers will receive a total of $1.4 million in loan forgiveness.
Eligible borrowers who attended these institutions will receive the aid automatically, even if they didn’t apply for it, the department said.
Those who qualify should begin receiving emails in the coming days.
Borrowers with disabilities
An additional 61,000 federal student loan borrowers with a “total and permanent” disability will receive $2.5 billion in debt erasure, the Education Department said on Monday.
This round of relief includes some borrowers automatically approved for debt forgiveness through data matches with the U.S. Social Security Administration and the Department of Veteran Affairs. Other borrowers applied for the loan discharge.
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Borrowers may qualify for a Total and Permanent Disability, or TPD, Discharge if they suffer from a mental or physical disability that is severe and permanent, and prevents them from working. Proof of the disability can come from a doctor, the Social Security Administration, or the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Public servants
The Education Department also granted loan forgiveness to 6,100 borrowers under the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program totaling $465 million.
The program, which former President George W. Bush signed into law in 2007, allows employees of the government and certain not-for-profit entities to have federal student loans discharged after 10 years of on-time payments.
The Biden administration has tried to reverse the trend of borrowers being excluded from PSLF on technicalities. It has broadened eligibility and allowed people to reapply for relief, as long as they were working in the public sector and paying down their debt.
With the PSLF help tool, borrowers can also search for a list of qualifying employers under the program and access the employer certification form. Go to studentaid.gov to learn about all the program’s requirements.