Education Sec. announces ‘unprecedented milestone’ for PSLF loans while visiting Georgia school

GWINNETT COUNTY, Ga. — Ahead of the U.S. Secretary of Education’s visit to Georgia, the Department of Education announced they’d reached an “unprecedented milestone” in their efforts to provide student loan relief to as many Americans as possible.

Education Secretary Miguel Cardona focused on student loan forgiveness and mental health resources in schools while visiting a Gwinnett County’s Five Forks Middle School on Thursday.

According to the announcement from the Department of Education, and Cardona while in Georgia, the federal government had approved $4.5 billion in new student loan relief for more than 60,000 American public service workers.

[DOWNLOAD: Free WSB-TV News app for alerts as news breaks]

The relief is part of what the Biden-Harris administration calls “significant fixes” to the Public Service Student Loan Forgiveness Program, and brings the total of loans forgiven to $175 billion among 4.8 million Americans.

From the total nationally, $74 billion was in assistance to more than one million borrowers who benefited from the PSLF Program.

TRENDING STORIES:

• Georgia schools, universities getting more than $9.66 million for mental health service programs
• Cobb County Schools remove 6 more ‘explicit’ books they say are inappropriate for children
• Joro spiders in GA found to have bacteria that makes them potentially sterile, new research shows

Before President Joe Biden took office in 2021, the Dept. of Education said only 7,000 public servants had ever received debt relief from the PSLF, with Cardona adding that it was mainly due to the program being “riddled by dysfunction.”

“The Public Service Loan Forgiveness program was so riddled by dysfunction that just 7,000 Americans ever qualified and countless public servants were trapped making payments on debts that should have been forgiven,” Cardona said in a statement. “From Day One, the Biden-Harris administration made fixing this broken program a top priority, and today, I’m tremendously proud that over one million teachers, nurses, social workers, veterans, and other public servants have received life-changing loan forgiveness.”

As of early October, 41,610 Georgia public servants had received PSLF discharges and approvals and covering about $3.8 billion in loans.

[SIGN UP: WSB-TV Daily Headlines Newsletter]

©2024 Cox Media Group