Can I Get A Grant To Pay Off My Student Loans?
We get this questions a lot and the short answer to it is Yes and No. There are no direct grants that will help you pay off your student loans but there is a relief program or also what is called as a forgiveness program where if you qualify you can have a significant amount of your student loans waived. While not technically a grant, these are known as ‘Public Student Loan Forgiveness(PSLF) Programs’. These student loan forgiveness programs are available to graduating students to assist them in reducing the burden of their outstanding loans. The graduating student can be majoring in any field and they can still be provided this financial assistance provided they qualify for it.
Do I Qualify For Student Loan Forgiveness?
The catch though is that the forgiveness program is not available for everyone. The PSLF was initiated to encourage individuals to work, on a full-time basis, in public service jobs. To qualify for this program, you should have made 120 payments on your Federal Student loan whilst being fully employed in public service, law enforcement agencies, teaching, doctors and nurses and other government based jobs. Just another factor to keep in mind when you decide on the direction of your career. There are some professions and jobs that bring with it a lot of incidental advantages. The field you choose to work in needs to be well thought out, after all it is something you will most likely be doing for a very long time, not to mention carrying the burden of a student loan for a number of post graduate years.
The PSLF program enables graduate students to eliminate a majority of their student loans and sometimes even pay the loan completely. This program is backed by the government and is available towards Direct Federal student loans. The following Direct Loans are covered under the Loan Forgiveness program
- Direct Stafford Loans (Subsidized and Unsubsidized)
- Federal Direct PLUS Loans
- Federal Consolidation Loans (Direct)
The above loans have to be non-defaulting loans. Besides Federal Direct Loans, the PSLF program allows other Federal student loans that have been consolidated under a Direct Consolidation loan. Therefore, all payments made under the consolidated loan will be counted for the120 payments made on a monthly basis.
These 120 payments should be made under these Direct Loan repayment plans:
- Income Contingent Repayment Plan
- Income Based Repayment Plan
- Standard Repayment Plan, having a repayment period of 10 years
- Other Direct Loan Program repayment plan, having a repayment period of 10 years
References
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Try http://www.fafsa.ed.gov/ Its the Free Application for Student Aid. Or to http://www.ed.gov/offices/OSFAP/DirectLoan/index.html
Get on google and research what you’re looking for.
good luck. i can not think of a single institution that will give you free money to use to pay for a student loan that you took out
There are NO grants for paying off student loans.
The government is NOT in the business of giving away free money for the sake of giving away money. There are no grants for paying bills, no grants for paying off credit cards, no grants for getting out of debt and no grants for simply fattening your wallet.
Grants are free, but it means OBLIGATION. You will be obligated to do as the grant sets out to do. Grants have objectives, and your purpose must fit the objective of the grant.
For one, you have to write the grant application and the grant application is not a simple document – you have to explain how your purpose for applying for the grant fits well with the objectives set out by the grant.
There is a stringent review process through a committee. You will compete with other applicants for the grant money, and this grant review committee will evaluate the merits of each proposal. Only those that they feel exemplifies the objective of the grant will be approved.
You can go to the Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance (CFDA) http://www.cfda.gov and Grants.gov http://www.grants.gov – these are two sites created by the federal government to provide transparency and information on grants. Browse through the listings and see if you can find any grant that would support your purposes.
Even if you buy books on "how to get grants" or list that supposedly has information on grants — all of them are mere rehash of what CFDA has, albeit packaged differently.
Note though that these grants generally support non-profit organizations, intermediary lending institutions, and state and local governments. Most of the federal grants are given to specific target groups with specific requirements (e.g. minority business owners involved in transportation related contracts emanating from DOT – Grant#20.905 Disadvantaged Business Enterprises Short Term Lending Program. Individuals especially for personal purposes are not eligible for federal grants.
Talk to a loan consolidation service or a credit counseling service as there are no grants for this purpose. Imagine if there is — no one in America will have a student loan or any bills for that matter because the government will just give them grant money to pay for these loans.