Reframing the Student Loan Costing Debate The Benefits of Competition

(EPI) is a non-profit, non-partisan, and non-governmental organization dedicated to policy-based research on educational opportunity for all students. With offices in Washington, DC, Toronto, Ontario, and Melbourne, Australia, EPI is a collective association of researchers and policy analysts from around the world dedicated to the mission of enhancing our knowledge of critical barriers facing students and families throughout the educational pipeline. The mission of EPI is to expand educational opportunity for low-income and other historically-underrepresented students through high-level research and analysis. By providing educational leaders and policymakers with the information required to make prudent programmatic and policy decisions, we believe that the doors of opportunity can be further opened for all students, resulting in an increase in the number of students prepared for, enrolled in, and completing postsecondary education. is currently associate professor in the School of Education at the University of San Diego, where he has also served as associate dean and director of strategic programs. Prior to joining the university faculty, he was project director for the national Direct Student Loan Evaluation project at Macro International, as well as the director of federal policy analysis at the American Council on Education, where he represented the interests of the higher education community before the Executive and Legislative branches of the federal government. Dr. Galloway received his bachelor's and master's degrees from the University of California, San Diego, and his doctoral degree in the economics of education from Harvard University. His research interests include higher education policy, the economics of education, and econometrics. is a Senior Analyst and Project Director with ORC Macro, International, where he specializes in issues relating to postsecondary education policy. His professional efforts have examined the impact of Federal regulations upon student retention and propensity for loan default, and postsecondary institutions' perceptions of burden; the optimality of the current statistical model used to identify aid applications in need of verification; the attitudes and practices of financial aid professionals with respect to the verification process, as well as their expectations regarding the Office of Federal Student Aid's Front End Business Integration; and the level of awareness of financial aid resources among high school students and their parents. As a political economist with a Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Maryland, his personal endeavors focus on incentive structures in the efficient provision of collectively consumed goods and services. FOREWORD In 1994, The Clinton Administration pushed and …