Recommended/Preferred Lender List Selection | Financial Aid

Carroll University is committed to helping students achieve their education goals by providing them with appropriate resources and guidance. Carroll prides itself in providing students and their families with a professional and unbiased approach to making the dream of higher education a reality. Our objectives include helping students by providing as much student aid as is available from all sources of federal and state assistance, institutional grants and scholarships, private scholarships offered by outside sources and student loans from alternative/private lenders.

Compliant to HEOA, which was signed into Federal law Aug. 14, 2008, Carroll University has established the following provisions for maintaining a recommended/preferred lender list. It is intended to ensure that Carroll complies fully with the federal law governing student lending and that all decisions concerning student loans are made ethically, free from conflicts of interest and in the best interests of the borrowers, students and parents.

Lender selection

Carroll feels it is important to give students and parents a starting point on where to begin the student loan search. It is our goal to provide a recommended lender list for our borrowers to present them with lenders who will offer good service and benefits.

Each year, Carroll will issue a Request for Information (RFI) to lenders associated with MASFAA (Midwest Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators). Once the responses are received, they are presented to a committee and each lender is evaluated. Each lender is scored using a pre-determined scorecard, which focuses on customer service, borrower benefits, fees and processing. The lenders with the highest scores in each loan type are placed on Carroll's recommended lender list, provided that there are at least two unaffiliated lenders on each list and that any affiliations are disclosed.

Once our list is determined, it is available on our website and upon request. Carroll notes that borrowers are not limited to the lenders on the list and that we will process the loan in a timely manner through any lender the borrower selects, as long as we are able.

The lenders presented to borrowers are chosen solely on the best interests of student and parent borrowers without regard to the financial interests of Carroll. The following information is available upon request or on Carroll's website: lender selection process; statement that borrowers are not limited to borrow from the lenders on the recommended list and we will process loans through any lender they select; comparative information regarding interest rates and other benefits offered by lenders.

We have always indicated to students that they have the right to choose the lender of their choice. We will process any loan application received, regardless of the lender chosen. Carroll University will continue the following practice per the Student Loan Sunshine Act (H.R. 890)

  • Establish and maintain a process for selecting lenders based on benefits to borrowers and disclose the rationale for selecting lenders included on the list Carroll University will disclose this information to students and lenders
  • Disclose the criteria and process used to select lenders on list
  • Continue to indicate to students that they have the right to choose the lender of their choice
  • Continue to provide a large sampling of lenders to chose from (minimum of 3 non-affiliated lenders)
  • Identify to students if lenders on list are affiliated with other lenders
  • Employees will not serve on lender advisory boards
  • University will not enter into a risk-sharing agreement with a lender
  • University will not allow staffing in financial aid office by lenders

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