AAUP and AFT Support Proposed Changes to the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program

The AAUP submitted joint comments with the American Federation of Teachers to the US Department of Education on Tuesday in support of the proposed changes to the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program.

"On behalf of the 1.7 million members of the American Federation of Teachers, including the members of the American Association of University Professors—many of whom are student loan borrowers and the vast majority of whom work in public service—we write in strong support of the proposed changes to the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program. These changes will remove unnecessary bureaucratic hurdles and restore PSLF to closer to the program Congress envisioned, making PSLF work for the borrowers it was intended to help, keeping the promise of PSLF."

The organizations wrote that "PSLF guarantees that those who work in public service and consistently pay their monthly student loan bills will have the balance of their loans forgiven after 10 years. But borrowers have faced rampant servicer misconduct, were issued confusing and sometimes contradictory guidance about the status of their applications and had no clear process for contesting erroneous decisions."

While the AAUP and AFT support the changes put forward by the department, we encourage the department to do far better in providing access to this program for all those who do public service work but are currently excluded from accessing the program based on existing regulations.

View a PDF of the comments.