December 7, 2010 - Edition 583 TG
Shoptalk

Industry Update

Final Rules revamp verification
The Program Integrity final rules significantly change verification requirements and introduce new requirements on providing updated information to ED. The new verification rules will take effect on July 1, 2012, a year later than other program integrity issues.

Defining a "credit hour" for Title IV program purposes
To improve consistency among schools, ED provides a comprehensive definition of a "credit hour" that must be used by schools to determine eligibility and funding amounts in the Title IV programs.

Reporting and disclosure requirements for gainful employment in a recognized occupation
The final rules included changes (effective July 1, 2011) for schools collecting, reporting, and disclosing data on certain educational programs and related outcomes for students.

Gainful employment in a recognized occupation — new programs
This article focuses on final rules (effective July 1, 2011) for a school seeking to offer an additional program leading to gainful employment for students.

TG Report

TG schedules early 2011 webinars for TG Financial Literacy Program
The TG Financial Literacy Program covers a range of topics, such as managing credit and solving debt problems. TG has scheduled webinar trainings for schools that wish train students using TG's presentations.

Join TG for a December webinar on entrance and exit counseling
TG will offer an entrance and exit counseling webinar on December 16. The webinar is designed to help participants learn the basic requirements of loan counseling, explore specific strategies for counseling effectively, and identify resources to enhance their understanding of loan counseling requirements.

Evaluating your default prevention effort? Take TG's school self-assessment
If you're enhancing your campus default prevention program, you'll find support in TG's default aversion self-assessment tool, an online evaluation for examining processes and goals; comparing recent cohort default rates with similar institutions; and learning more about strategies for improving default aversion.

New TG financial literacy workshop for students offers strategies for solving debt problems
College borrowing is on the rise and, with it, the debt burdens many students carry as they graduate. Perhaps one of the best ways to help these students is an in-school money management workshop that offer strategies for solving debt problems.

Smart Solutions
Your fall graduates are probably in the middle of lining up job interviews. Offer them Adventures In Education's sample résumés to use as a template in creating or enhancing a résumé. A concisely-worded, well-organized résumé can be a candidate's foot in the door for that first position after college.
News Briefs

Not surprisingly, given the rough economy, student loan borrowing has gone up, both in terms of the percentage of students borrowing and the amount borrowed. According to a Pew Research Center analysis of data provided by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), 60 percent of all graduates in 2008 had borrowed to pay for college as compared to 52 percent of graduates in 1996. Graduates are leaving with more debt also — about $23,000 in student loans as compared with $17,000 in 1996. One factor driving this increase is the growth in enrollment for private, for-profit schools. Over this past decade, enrollment has risen dramatically at such schools. Students attending them are more likely to borrow and borrow large amounts. Learn more about the rise in borrowing for college.