Students Reimbursed From National Student Loan Scandal

Congressional investigators and state attorneys general nationwide are continuing to discover kickbacks paid by lenders to school heads of financial id in return for student borrowers being given their name on a “Preferred Lender” list. An email was issued today by Barry Burgdorf, general Students Reimbursed from National Student Loan Scandal counsel for The University of Texas (UT)System, instructing all UT System campuses “to immediately cease and desist use of all preferred lender lists, including, but not limited to, the removal of such lists from Web sites and ceasing further dissemination of such lists to students.” This action was directed as a result of the school’s investigation of Lawrence Burt, director of financial aid at UT, Austin. Burgdorf must examine Burt’s past ownership of stock in a parent company of a student loan company that is listed as one of the school’s 20 preferred lenders. Burt is on paid leave pending the results of the investigation.

A national investigation by New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has uncovered other improprieties by Timothy Lehmann, the director of financial aid at Capella University, an online school based in Minneapolis. Cuomo says Lehmann was paid more than $13,000 in consulting fees by Student Loan Xpress. Cuomo’s office said a consulting company run by Walter Cathie, the dean of financial aid at Widener University in Pennsylvania, was paid $80,000 by Student Loan Xpress since 2005.More details links.....