USA Funds at a Glance 2010

During the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2010, USA Funds^® built on its efforts to promote preparation for, access to and success in higher education.

• USA Funds provided more than $7.6 million in scholarships and grants to programs that promote higher education preparedness, access and success.
• Nearly $1.9 million in USA Funds Access to Education Scholarships^® helped 1,274 low- to moderate-income students pay college expenses for the 2010-2011 academic year.
• USA Funds presented a total of $500,000 to five national scholarship organizations that promote access to higher education for minority students: the American Indian College Fund, Asian and Pacific Islander American Scholarship Fund, Hispanic Scholarship Fund, Thurgood Marshall College Fund and United Negro College Fund.
• More than 32,000 middle school students and members of their families took part in presentations of USA Funds Unlock the Future^® and USA Funds Consejos through schools, community agencies and faith-based organizations. USA Funds Unlock the Future is an early awareness program that informs students and their families about the value of postsecondary education. USA Funds Consejos is a similar program geared to Latino students and their families.
• USA Funds Life Skills^®, an online program that teaches students to manage their time and money during school and after graduation, was in use on 58 campuses at 49 institutions. Students completed 14,631 USA Funds Life Skills user sessions in 2010.
• USA Funds University conducted 114 free financial aid workshops, with nearly 3,500 school and lender representatives attending events in 59 cities nationwide. Financial aid administrators and lenders recorded nearly 17,000 learner sessions through online courses, while 93 webcasts reached more than 9,000 participants.
• USA Funds’ financial aid policy advisers offer an e-mail resource to quickly address specific policy questions they receive from campus financial aid staff as well as lenders. In 2010 USA Funds Ask Policy^SM responded to 1,145 inquiries.
• A team of 250 default prevention professionals, supported by USA Funds, successfully averted default on 93 percent of seriously past-due education loans, helping to prevent $26.3 billion in defaults on 1.7 million federal student loans.
• If, in spite of USA Funds’ default prevention efforts, a borrower defaults, federal law requires USA Funds to continue to pursue recovery of outstanding amounts owed taxpayers. In 2010 USA Funds recovered nearly $1.3 billion from borrowers in default on their USA Funds-guaranteed loans.
• Student loan policy and compliance staff from USA Funds worked to resolve 700 borrower complaints dealing with a wide range of issues, including disputes about loan balances, repayment plans, collection practices, and loan discharge and cancellation requests. They conducted 27 reviews of the administration of the Federal Family Education Loan Program by individual schools, lenders, loan servicers and collection agencies to ensure compliance with the FFELP guidelines.
• USA Funds’ volume of nearly $7.7 billion in new loans it guaranteed helped 810,660 students and parents pay higher education expenses. Included in USA Funds’ total guarantee volume were $7 billion in Federal Stafford loans for students and $660 million in Federal PLUS loans to graduate students and parents of dependent undergraduate students. These loan volume figures represent activity from Oct. 1, 2009, through June 30, 2010; the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010 ended the origination of new guaranteed loans under the FFELP effective July 1, 2010.