Student Loan Forgiveness Extravaganza

While some college grads enjoy a time of whimsical life exploration after graduation, others realize that they owe $100,000 in student loans. Like everybody else, you want to spend a year in the Amazon basin studying pink river dolphins, but you can't just pause payment on the loans because Sallie Mae will hunt you down and slay all of your dolphin friends.

So you are stuck trying to strike a balance between what is financially responsible (making a large income to pay off loans quickly) and what you actually want to spend your time doing (riding dolphins). Or maybe you just want to take a low-paying public service job.

You've probably heard about the Public Service Loan Forgiveness deal where after 10 years of public service the balance of your federal loans are forgiven. A standard loan repayment plan usually is on a 10-year schedule, so this loan forgiveness is only really pertinent if you are on a different repayment plan. You have to make 120 payments, but they don't have to be consecutive. There are exceptions for PeaceCorps and Americorps. If you are planning to request this loan forgiveness, make sure you are keeping documentation of your employment and loan payments. Check out these PDFs for more specific info: (Q&As) and fact sheet. Honestly this program is a lot less useful than I thought, considering most people are on track to pay off their loans in 10 years.

There are loan forgiveness programs for:

• teachers in low income schools
• nurses in non-profits
• healthcare practitioners who serve min. 2 years at underserved sites with the National Health Service Corps (aka be a dentist in Arkansas)
  
• people who serve in AmeriCorps ($4,725 after completing 1700 hours)
• PeaceCorps volunteers (repay 15% of a volunteer’s qualified student loans for each year of service until 70% of the starting balance is repaid)
• health/science researchers
  
• lawyers in public service: ABA (see menu at left) and Equal Justice Works
• veterinarians who work in shortage areas
• law enforcement officers, armed services
  

Just google your state/field of work. You probably know more than I do about your profession/training, I'm just here to say TRACK IT DOWN because it may be thousands of dollars. Talk to your HR department, maybe they've got some sneaky tricks. Just because it's too late for scholarships doesn't mean the free money has run out. And if you're applying to grad schools, compare your potential schools' public service loan forgiveness programs. Or pull a Laura and go for a PhD where they pay you instead of a master's where you pay the school. High five!