School Funding CenterCentral source of expertise on school improvement issues

If you’re a student who has accumulated a huge amount on your multiple student loans, you must be looking for some option that can assist you in getting out of the debt mire. When your monthly payments are not manageable enough and when you have trouble meeting all the monthly debt obligations, you should be sure enough that you need to take solid steps that could ensure a debt free life. Just as payday loan debtors need to go for payday loan consolidation, the student loan debtors also need to opt for consolidation. Being a student, you’re more responsible to maintain a good credit score as your employers will check your score before employing you within their organization. Here are some benefits that you may reap when you take out a direct debt consolidation loan in order to combine your federal student loans.

• No minimum amount for qualification: When you want to take out a debt consolidation loan from a private lending institution they will ask you for the minimum loan amount without incurring which you can never take out such a master loan. But this is not the same with the direct debt consolidation loan. You can take out the consolidation loan with any amount of money that you’ve accumulated on your multiple student loans.

• Various repayment options: Yes, most students look for the flexibility in the repayment options before choosing a debt consolidation loan. When you take out a direct debt consolidation loan, you may be offered different loan repayment options among which the most common are Income Based Repayment Plan and Income Contingent Repayment Plan. The student borrower can even switch from one repayment plan to another according to their present financial needs.

• A single monthly payment: You just have to make a single monthly payment towards the debt consolidation loan. It becomes tough when you have to split your payments among different lenders and you can effortlessly forget all these hassles when you consolidate through a direct debt consolidation loan. You just have to write a single check to the debt consolidation loan and also remember a single date.

• The monthly payments will be reduced: The monthly payments as the interest rate on the debt consolidation loan will be much lower than what you were paying on the individual student loans. The repayment term of the loan will also be extended so that the borrower can repay the loan without having to fall back on all the other monthly debt obligations.

Therefore, when you’re drowning in high interest debt mire, you should take out a direct debt consolidation loan so that you can easily combine your payments and live off the cycle of debt. However, manage your finances and make timely payments on the debt consolidation loan in order to avoid hurting your credit score.

Are you interested in exploring technology and education, especially regarding tools, techniques, culture, identity, and so much more?

We have the workshop for you this Summer.

Recurring Questions of Technology is a 5-day open institute that explores these questions, with leading scholars facilitating the exploration. This is a joint institute between UBC and SFU, with speakers from both universities, as well as John Willinsky, noted scholar in the field from Stanford University. Some of those scheduled to speak or teach are Mary Bryson, Teresa Dobson, Richard Cavell, Andrew Feenberg, and many more.

This course can be taken either for UBC/SFU credit or as a non-credit seminar. Instructions for how to register, as well as all relevant information about the course,  are on the program web site.

The course will run from July 9-13, 2012.

Each day in the course consists of both a class (9:00 am 3:00 pm)  and an afternoon lecture (3:30 pm 5:00 pm).  Only those registered can attend the class, but the lecture is open to all with no registration required.

You can sign up for individual days or register for the whole 5-day course, whichever meets your needs and interests.

Check out the course web site for a full schedule, including speakers, topics of discussion, fees, etc.

The Pima Community College board voted 3-2 Wednesday night against a proposal to appoint Provost Suzanne Miles to the college’s top position automatically once Chancellor Roy Flores retires.

An overflow crowd of about 220 people turned out at the Board of Governors meeting, and most who spoke called for a national search for chancellor.

Flores, 69, who recently said he will retire by the end of this year, announced plans Tuesday to take medical leave effective today to deal with health issues.

Flores’ contract expires in June 2014, and under the proposal, Miles, now the college’s second in command, would have served out the rest of his term. She would have earned the same base salary, more than $270,000, and received nearly the same benefits as Flores.

Board Chairman Scott A. Stewart and members David A. Longoria favored offering Miles the automatic contract.

Voting against Miles’ automatic appointment and leaning toward a national search were members Brenda Even (who took part in the meeting by teleconference), Marty Cortez and Sherryn S. “Vikki” Marshall.

Cortez said she looks for Miles to be a candidate considered in the national search because she is qualified to compete.

College attorney John Richardson said the board is likely to set a meeting within a month to discuss a search.

Call for “vigorous” search

In the call to the audience before the vote, Miguel Palacios, former PCC Desert Vista Campus president who worked for the college for more than 30 years, was one of nine people who spoke against the automatic appointment.

“Over the years the college has taken great pains to select top-flight faculty and top-notch staff through extensive and competitive processes. The selection of the next chancellor should be no less vigorous to assure that the most qualified person is selected,” he said.

Palacios added, “Many of us in the community are keenly aware of the current troubled state of the college, and I submit to you that it will take a uniquely qualified individual to lead this institution through these difficult times and restore the college’s credibility and standing in this community.”

Several speakers referred to an article Sunday in the Arizona Daily Star revealing that PCC paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to a consultant, John Crnokrak of Wisconsin, who was hired in a manner that bypassed the college’s competitive bidding process. Crnokrak forwarded lewd emails to the school’s executives and billed the public for a personal massage, the Star’s investigation of college records showed.

Scott Collins, on the math faculty at PCC’s West Campus, told the board that a national search isn’t the easiest way but is the best way to fill the top post.

Collins, immediate past president of the PCC Education Association, said he had a petition with 187 signatures favoring the appointment of an interim chancellor while a national search is conducted.

Michael Coiro, executive director of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 449, said the board should know that there is an unfortunate perception that it rubber-stamps contract renewals. He also called for a national search.

Four people spoke in favor of Miles’ appointment, including Heather Tilson, Miles’ senior assistant. Tilson said Miles “leads with humility and fosters an open work environment.”

Miles also recognizes leadership in others and embraces it for the good of the college, while bringing a sense of humor that energizes the staff, Tilson said.

A recommendation included in the board’s agenda package said Miles’ appointment “would promote a smooth and cost-effective transition” when Flores retires.

Miles has been at PCC for 20 years, most recently as executive vice chancellor and president of the college’s community campus, in addition to her provost duties. She also filled in for Flores while he recuperated from bypass surgery.

Board member Cortez said of the vote, “When it is all said and done, there’s going to be unhappy people tonight. We need to come together and do what is best for our students, faculty, staff and the community.”

Longer contracts approved

In one of his last acts before taking medical leave, Flores asked the Governing Board to approve two-year contracts for his entire top tier of executives, who have had only one-year contracts until now.

They include Miles; Pima’s finance chief, David Bea; college spokesman C.J. Karamargin; human resources boss Janet May; and five campus presidents.

By a 5-0 vote Wednesday night, the Governing Board approved the longer contracts.

Flores needs “time to heal”

As for his medical leave, Flores said in a written news release that he will take the time to concentrate on recovering from heart problems. “My soul’s still strong, but my heart of late has been less than completely dependable, and I need to listen to my cardiologists and take the necessary time to heal,” he said in the release.

Flores underwent emergency angioplasty on Friday at Tucson Medical Center after experiencing severe chest pains while at the college’s district offices. In October, he underwent a quadruple-bypass heart surgery.

“The selection of the next chancellor should be no less vigorous to assure that the most qualified person is selected.”

Miguel Palacios, former PCC Desert Vista Campus president

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday turned aside an appeal from an Oregon family seeking reimbursement for the private placement of a child in a school charging tuition of $5,200 per month.

The case is noteworthy because the justices in 2009 used it to decide that, in principle, the main federal special education law authorizes reimbursements for private school tuition even when a child has never received special education services.

The court that year ruled 6-3 in Forest Grove School District v. T.A. that 1997 amendments to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act meant to rein in the costs of private school placements did not remove the power of hearing officers and federal judges to order such reimbursements under the proper circumstances.

Writing in dissent, Justice David H. Souter, joined by Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas, warned that the majority’s decision could prove costly for school districts. “The more private placement there is, the higher the special education bill,” then-Justice Souter said.

The 2009 decision was a victory at the time for the parents of a boy with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder who had clashed with the Forest Grove school district in Oregon before placing the child in the private Mount Bachelor Academy.

But the family’s battle with the school district continued after the Supreme Court’s decision, with a federal district court considering the “equities” on remand. The district court ended up denying any tuition reimbursement to the parents because they “appear to have enrolled T.A. in [Mount Bachelor] not because of any disability recognized by the IDEA but because of his drug abuse and behavioral problems,” as the district court put it.

A panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, in San Francisco, upheld the district court in in a 2-1 decision last April.

In their appeal to the Supreme Court, the parents said the 9th Circuit’s decision that the reasons for the private school placement can be the key factor in an IDEA reimbursement decision conflicted with a decision by another federal appeals court. The parents also argued that the lower courts should have considered partial reimbursement of the private school tuition.

The justices on Jan. 23 declined, without comment, to hear the parents’ appeal in T.A. v. Forest Grove School District .