Federal Shutdown Effects

Financial aid administrators should be aware of how the federal shutdown is affecting their students.

For example, at medical schools, students have been told their living expense stipends for the Health Professions Scholarship Program will be delayed.  Other students receiving the National Health Service Corps Scholarships may have living expense disbursements from their scholarships delayed.  This comes at term-end and is stressful for the students involved, to say the least!  Financial aid offices should expect get loan requests and, possibly requests for short term loans from the school to help fill the gaps.

Here's a link to an article that discusses other ways higher education is affected by the shutdown:

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/10/03/shutdown-effects-on-colleges/2915629/

And here's a link to the Information for Financial Aid Professionals (ifap) website and a Dear Colleague letter that discusses the effects of the shutdown:

http://ifap.ed.gov/eannouncements/092713PotentialGovernmentShutdown.html