The increasing number of students in the universities and colleges faces a big challenge on where to get sufficient funds of aid to complete their studies. The Student Aid program recommendations try to find ways that can improve the efficiency in the aid program especially to reach the low-income students. The different components of the government have played significant role in making sure that the 30 recommendations provided in the federal aid that helps make the process of getting the funds and repaying it much simple (Burd, Carey, Delisle, Fishman, Holt, Laitinen & McCann 1).
The executive, for example, made reforms on the Federal loans program where they abolished the subsidies given to private lenders that government students had to give out. Instead, it shifted the loans program to the Education Division in the United States that deals with direct lending of loans to government students. The executive provided that the students with older loans be given higher incentives to help them get the finances to repay back their debts to the Direct Loans. The executive has been in the forefront to pass to approve the grants that will help increase the grants to an appropriate level that will benefit the students who really need the funds in order to complete their studies. It was evident in the approval of an extra $819 in 2010 that was component of the American Act on Retrieval and Reinvestment. Since then, the executive has increased the amount of funds given to the regular appropriation and close the gap in funding by decreasing the costs and removing the Pell Grant eligibility (Matsudaira, Adrienne & Walsh 10). The congress has done all of changes in the draft to allow the legislature to make changes on the funding programs by endorsing the 2011 Budget Control Act.
The executive is trying to restructure the Federal loan program in order to help reduce the wasteful practice common among private lenders. The main purpose of changes in the Federal loan program is to eliminate defaults. The students will repay the loans depending on the amount of salary they get. The process will also help encourage students to cut down on their costs and empowering institutions to control unnecessary borrowing (Hannaway & Rotherham 12).
The legislature has a big role in making the reforms that will help improve this long-term program. The major challenge faced by the aid fund if lack of sufficient funds due to soaring of college prices. The legislature has taken upon itself the task of providing the extra $67.8 billion to help finance the budget crisis it had faced. The maximum award provided in the past years by the congress was $5,550, but now the legislature has to come up with the extra funds because of the increasing college process. The legislature has been in the lead in providing the finances for the Pell Grant by providing a regular annual allocation of funds, provision of supplement funding and the prerogative formula. The legislature determines the minimum amount that students get and then give the congress a sum of the approximate value. The legislature in 2010 made changes to the previous minimum account given to students and made it permanent, they included the inflation clause that caters for the rising rates of inflation (Burd, Carey, Delisle, Fishman, Holt, Laitinen & McCann 4).
The legislature made it possible for the second funding of the Grant by including $13.5 billion to the Act.11 on the Health Provision and Education Resolution. Later on they adapted a number of changes aimed at helping the undergraduates by suspending the grace period of the Subsidized Stafford loans in the 2012 fiscal year. The changes in the 2011 Budget Control Act provides a platform for the legislature to adapt changes that will help to increase funding to the Pell Grant financial support precipice in future and provide a permanent amount of funding that will not require supplementary funds.
