Switching to Direct federal student loans has been a mess for my school. Students need to sign their new master promissory note by Aug 10 or they will be dropped from their classes. I found this out by chance. Maybe the school sent out notices, but who looks at their college email over the summer?
If this is happening in other schools, this first year with Direct loans will be a disaster. Schools will either have to grant extensions, which will mean that they will be late paying their employees, or else they will lose a lot of students.
There should have been more notice and direction given to students before they left for summer break. Even if the law did not get signed until late, the government could have waited another semester for it to take effect. Maybe it will work out better in the end, but the beginning of having only Direct loans has not been good. ==================================================
We're into the second year now, and I think it is universally agreed that the process is much smoother and faster than the year before, and maybe even smoother than FFELP loans ever were. No major delays in applying or receiving aid were reported.
