Sen. Amy Klobuchar answers questions from a local TV news crew before speaking to an NCC audience.

Klobuchar visits NCC to offer financial aid alternatives

by David Iversen

Amy Klobuchar visited NCC last week to speak about education, health care and her other plans as a newly elected U.S. senator from Minnesota.

Klobuchar, who took office Jan. 3, spoke to an audience of over 200 about initiatives she has proposed that she says will help her “continue to fight for Minnesota education."

The Senate recently passed a bill, Klobuchar said, that will increase funding for Pell Grants to $4,310. The senator said she would like to see further funding for the Pell Grant, which targets students whose family annual income is less than $50,000.

Earlier this month, Klobuchar introduced a bill creating the Student Aid Reward (STAR) program. It asks the secretary of Education to choose between the two main types of student loan programs, the Federal Family Education Loan program (FFEL) and the Direct Loan (DL) program.

“Schools would be rewarded with additional scholarship funds for utilizing the more efficient of the two student loan programs,” Klobuchar said. “The competition would encourage the federal loan programs to improve the efficiency of their operations.”

The FFEL asks private lenders and banks to offer loans that are subsidized by the federal government.  The DL program offers loans coming directly from the U.S. Treasury.

“The DL is much less expensive because it secures loan capital at a lower rate, eliminates the middleman and cuts out billions in unnecessary subsidies to banks,” according to Ross Corson, senior media adviser for the senator. “Student loans made through FFEL in 2007 will cost $3 more for every $100 lent than the same loans made with U.S. Treasury funds. The Senator wanted to come to a school and talk about all of these things,” Corson said. “Her first choice was Normandale, and we were honored to be here.”

The senator spoke for 25 minutes and answered three questions from students.
“She is very good at getting her message across,” said Julie Johnson, NCC professor. “She knows what she wants to say and how to say it.”

“I was really excited to come to Normandale,” Klobuchar said after her speech. “My father went to a community college, and I know how important they are.”