privacy

Update: Add Florida to the list, as the University of Miami caves to Sallie Mae:

According to excellent reporting in the St. Petersburg Times, many University of Miami incoming freshmen were surprised this summer when they received pre-filled out master promissory notes from loan giant Sallie Mae even though they never actually applied for a loan. The students were particularly shocked to see that the notes included personal information, such as their Social Security numbers and birthdates, which they had not authorized the university to release.

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Higher Education Watch is reporting a disturbing piece of news. Sallie Mae and other corporate lenders are using state Freedom of Information Laws in a bid to force colleges and universities to hand over private information about students and their financial status. So far these types of requests are known to have been filed in New York, Pennsylvania and Oregon.

According to Higher Ed Watch, Sallie Mae will not challenge any schools that refuse to comply with the request, and insist that their intent in making such requests is to inform students of "all of their financial options." That is a hard pill to swallow. Sallie Mae is a company that profits by pushing more costly private loans on students over loans that come directly from the federal government. As Higher Ed Watch notes, a more likely explanation is that Sallie Mae and other lenders are targeting schools where they have failed to be included on the preferred lender list - a listing of private lending institutions that school financial aid offices provide to students who need to fill in the gaps in their funding after grants and federal lending options are exhausted.

What can be done? Students at schools can engage their financial aid offices to see if Sallie Mae or other lenders have issues such requests, and activists can work towards strengthening the Family Federal Education Rights and Privacy Act. FOI laws were created to increase transparency in government, not to allow corporations to exploit young people trying to pay for an education.