Your host interviews Christina Ceballos a second time about her work related to Public Service Loan Forgiveness, in addition to other topics related to navigating higher education.
A show about navigating higher education’s hidden curriculum as a first-generation scholar of color.
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: Thanks
again for listening into Your
Shadow Advisor, a weekly program
about navigating higher
education from a first
generation person of color
perspective. I'm your host,
Professor Darrel Wanzer-Serrano.
We're back for another week
talking about public service
loan forgiveness. We're joined
again by Christina Ceballos, who
is going to continue talking
about some of the themes that we
that we began addressing last
week. But I think go into more
detail about about public
service loan forgiveness for
people who are currently in
school and who are considering
entering careers that fit within
this rubric of public service.
So just a reminder from from
last week, our guest in 2018,
found in the Public Service Loan
Forgiveness support Facebook
group, after not finding any
active groups on that platform.
She has built a small but mighty
team of 16 administrators and
moderators, which now serves
over 135,000 members and
growing. She has served in many
capacities and public service in
America for the US Peace Corps,
nonprofits and government. She
lives in Austin, Texas, with her
husband and two rescue dogs. So
welcome again. Thanks for
joining me for for another
conversation about this stuff
that is fascinating and
important.
Christina Ceballos: Thanks so
much for having me there. I
super appreciate that
opportunity.
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: So last
time, we kick things off with
your superhero origin story. And
I was wondering if you could
give us a little recap of your
journey through higher ed, and
feel free to add anything in
that you want it that you feel
like you might have missed last
time.
Christina Ceballos: Sure, thank
you. Um, so my higher ed journey
started. At six years old when I
saw my mother graduate from
Metro State University in
Minnesota, that's where I grew
up. And she was able to go to
college, she was first
generation, she was able to go
to college because she enlisted
in the army and was able to
benefit from the higher
education benefits from her four
plus years of service. So I was
six years old when I saw her
walk down the aisle with the cap
and gown. And I just knew that
this was a part of my my future.
As she that seeing your mother
do this was a was a powerful
image. And I'll never forget it.
My father, on the other hand,
was wicked smart. So he did. He
served in the military a long
time, and only had a couple of
years of of higher ed. He never
completed college, but he didn't
need it. My brother and I, my
older half brother and I are
first generation college
completers in my brothers living
out in Seattle. From that
experience, just briefly, to
recap from last week, in high
school, I learned about post
secondary enrollment option,
which was a vehicle the state of
Minnesota had set up for high
schoolers to attend public
universities and college
community colleges to start
earning both high school credit
and college credit at the same
time. So I got here in Texas, I
think it's called dual
enrollment. Other states have
other names for it, but it's it
was a wonderful opportunity to
branch out have these new
experiences as a high schooler.
After two years, I got I earned
enough. I earned 32 College
quarter credits at the time, and
those transferred to the
University of Minnesota where I
got a four year scholarship, it
was both merit and financial
based by my senior year, you
know, circumstances had it that
I had to actually take out
student loans to be able to
complete but I was able to do
because I had such a head start
and it's such a head start on my
French degree. I was able to
complete two degrees in four
years. So there that was just an
incredible, you know, trajectory
in higher education. I graduated
in 2001. This is dating me
before 911 and 911 had a huge
impact on me. I was planning on
going into Peace Corps right
after college. But I decided to
stay home and serve locally
first and kind of let
geopolitics settle a bit. After
Peace Corps I moved to Austin,
Texas and I pursued a
certificate Nonprofit Management
Leadership at Austin Community
College great program. And I
also pursued a master's degree
at St. Edwards University in
2011, graduate in 2013. Because
of the Public Service Loan
Forgiveness Program, it opened
up the doors for me to pursue
highridge an advanced degree at
a local university, where as
before PSLF was announced, I was
looking at all the programs that
USP score offers through their
fellows program in but that
would have required me to leave
Austin and I really didn't want
to leave Austin, so I pursued
higher ed, or an advanced degree
because of PSLF. Locally,
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: yeah, I,
you know, it's we have such
different experiences on on that
side of things, because, you
know, PSLF didn't exist yet.
When I started, I started
graduate school straight out of
undergrad. So I got my undergrad
degree in 1999, excuse me dating
myself, and took a leisurely
pace through the through the
dissertation process. And so I
didn't finish until 2007. Before
PSLF was a NASA there was I
think, I think at the time, I'm
trying to remember back there
was some, like, acknowledgment
that this might become a thing.
But of course, that didn't, that
didn't happen until, until
definitely after I was, you
know, after I was graduated and,
and kind of pushed into a
certain consolidation by my
servicer and to lock in the good
interest rates at the time. So
PSLF was was that kind of, you
know, something pretty important
to your graduate school journey.
And I hope we'll get a chance to
talk about how that can be
centered and done smartly for
students who are in graduate
school now are considering
graduate school given all the we
know now about PSLF, and how it
works. And I know that's a
constantly evolving thing. But I
want to talk I want to first
talk a little bit more about
about how you started the Public
Service Loan Forgiveness
Program, support Facebook group,
which is such an important and
wonderful community. I was just
reading some posts again this
morning to seeing some of the
seeing if I could if I could add
to any of the conversations
about some of the experiences
people are going through right
now. And you touched about this
briefly in the last in the last
episode, but I was wondering if
you could talk in some more
detail about what prompted you
to start that Facebook group
that now as I just mentioned,
has over 135,000 members like,
why did you found the group? And
how has it grown or changed over
the years now that it's been a
group for four years, almost
Christina Ceballos: five, it'll
be February 9 2018 is the date I
found it and I do want to add an
asterix. I had a co founder. And
they're no longer on the
platform. They they they decided
to leave the platform. I said,
Okay, I'll hang out here. So,
basically, what prompted me to
start it is in 2017, the fire
was laid under me to get
everything in order. And it came
on the heels of Donald Trump's
election when and his pending
inauguration. That's truth,
because I was very concerned
that this program would go away.
At that time, I had very little
clue had no clue that PSLF is
written into my promissory notes
from PSLF. I had no fear I
should have, you know, but it
prompted me it lit the fire
under me. So even though I had
consolidated my loans back in
2012, for my from my FFL loans
to my knowledge in my then
direct, consolidated undergrad
loans. I still went back and to
my employer at Austin,
Independent School District and
said, Can you please fill out
this form? And I said, if
anything ever changes, I want
credit. I don't know how it
would change if it would ever
change but I want credit. And
for some reason I was present on
that. Had no idea this was
coming. Then I also went back to
another former employer,
Environmental Defense Fund. I
worked there for four and a half
years I got all my employment
certified. This was an I had
left in 2014. And I said I don't
know, but I want it. I want to
credit for this. And so what
that did was it triggered my
loans to move from Great Lakes
over to federal. And in that
process. I was all for doing my
own personal market research,
right, just research just
figuring out who on the platform
was was discussing PSLF. This
was 2017, the 10 year period was
up and coming in there were
active, there were groups, some
were active, some were very low,
you know, low, low, low
membership numbers. And I'm
like, there's nothing wrong with
that. But nothing really bespoke
jumped out at me as being
something that I should get
involved with. I was at the time
involved with nonprofit Happy
Hour, which is,
which is a spin off of, of
nonprofit AF, which is a blog
and it's funny and irreverent.
And, and I approached them with
this with this. In that group I
found, who was then my, my co
founder, and we started talking,
and we wanted to approach them.
And we did to ask them, Hey, can
we spin off a PSLF, nonprofit
AF, you know, or a nonprofit
happy our Facebook group, and
they weren't interested in that
as fine. So we kind of looked at
it, like virtually looked at
each other, like, oh, I guess
it's on us, if we want to build
something together, that will
address our needs. And so we
just dove in, I personally was a
bit reluctant, I was a little, I
approached it with a lot of
trepidation, because I had never
done this before. So I was what
Bill Collins, Bill Collins
calls, you know, building the
plane, while flying it in good,
good degree, right. And his
really seminal book about change
agents in Oregon change or
change change agent
organizations. And so we were
learning as we're going, while
while building it was well,
bringing new people in at first
it was public, anybody could
join. And then as we move
forward, we saw these folks are
sharing, the folks, our members
were sharing very, very personal
details, their financial
details. They're, you know,
those underlying shame, guilt,
like oh, my gosh, how did I get
in this position? Moments. And I
wanted to protect that we wanted
to protect that. And so we made
it private. And so it was over
time. Also, the helpers started
coming to the top, they started
surfacing the people with the
deepest knowledge and
understanding of PSLF how does
the safely and correctly convey
that information in so what we
ended up doing is we would
invite them to become
moderators. and promote some to
admins. The admin team is what I
consider the core leadership of
the mod min mod admin team. And
we we have a couple tiers, to
deal with delicate stuff at
different and different stuff at
different levels. So over the
over time, we did that. And now
we've had some turnover, but the
retention is crazy high like I
would say, you know, 70% of the
team is hasn't left since
they've been promoted. And a
part of that is, you know, is is
just our working together so
collaboratively, our commitment
to helping others suffer less
than us, as well as you know, to
be that trusted third party
resource outside the DOD and,
and student loan servicers.
When we hit our when we hit the
limited waiver announcement,
gosh, I ran these numbers A
while ago, so don't quote me on
this. But I think we're at
approximately 40,000 members,
somewhere around there, October
6 2021. We're now October or
August 24, less than nine, less
than 10 months since the waiver
was announced. And we're at
almost 140,000 members. So we've
grown. We've added 100,000
members approximately, since
October of last year, it has
been intense. It has prompted us
to you know, organize our
information differently, how to
manage all that. And and it's
also, you know, to avoid
burnout, because I'm committed
that for our team to never burn
out. Because the department of
education and student loan
servicers haven't provided
accurate information in a timely
efficient manner. We are not
going to prepare for that. And
so my commitment to them is
always how can we manage this
better? Always Oh, into their
suggestions, always about
experimenting to see how it can
be done differently within the
confines of the platform, as
well as you know, hearing where
my where my team is at. So
that's why we instituted two
days a week pause now, so we're
on five days off two weeks, and
it has to be like that, at
least, to the waiver ends.
Because we are, it's literally
so much need, the need is so
immense right now. So it's, that
that's kind of like the high
level arc of that. And, again,
just so much kudos and praise
for my team for hanging in
there, talking about expressing
themselves, you know, pitching
those, those ideas on how to
work better, because because of
it, because of that, we are
still here, and we're still able
to help so many,
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: well,
I'll say, from, from a kind of
user experience perspective, as
one of those 100,000, that's
added in the in the last less
than a year, I really
appreciated from the, from the
moment I got in having these
kinds of steps to ensure that I
could be a, that I wasn't going
to be a bad member of the group,
right? That you have the guides
that, that people have to walk
themselves through the pause on
being able to post right so that
you can really take stuff in as
as a new member to the group,
the pause on posting every week,
to give everyone kind of
everyone I'm sure it's a it's a
really important for your, for
your mod min team, to have that
chance to breathe. And, and also
the the other thing that I that
I love about the group is are
the celebrations. And, and the
kind of, for lack of a better
way of putting it the purity of
the celebrations, right that
like, you know, it's one of the
rules of the group, don't hijack
people, celebration posts,
celebrate it for what it is. And
I think that's great. And to
just to see here to see these
posts, people who don't know
each other, but who've been in
similar boats, or are currently
in the same boat, and going
through their own struggles to
join in, and you get these posts
that are like, you know, it's
like 23456 700, you know, likes
and comments of like, Yay,
congratulations. Like, that's
really uplifting, especially
after such a like, as speaking
to someone who who got one of
those posts through. After
after, after incorrectly
prematurely submitting my post
before I got my before I got my
letter, my bad. But I was gently
reminded by a moderator and I
appreciated that. But you know,
having just people's joining in
the celebration, like was it was
like, this is like it's real.
This is great. And so I, I just
I think it's a great, it's a
it's really a model Facebook
group, for all the problems of
Facebook, I think y'all have
done a good job of, like you
said, kind of taken advantage of
the affordances of the platform
to be able to build a little
structure in there. And I I'm
not part of any other Facebook
groups that have really taken
advantage of so many features
that are baked into groups to
make sure that it kind of can
run a little bit more smoothly.
And with 140,000 members. That's
like really important. And so my
my hat's off to you all for, for
doing those things in that
group.
Christina Ceballos: Yes, and
thank you. And again,
congratulations on your PSLF
victory. That hashtag PSLF
Victory goes all the way back to
the very beginning of the group.
Because there are so many there,
there are fewer people, and
there are even fewer people
getting PSLF victories. So our
group our team decided, like
everyone who gets PSLF gets
their own post, because we want
to show people we want to show
our membership that this thing
is real. This thing is real
people actually do get it and
they share how they got it or
they share their timeline or
they just say thank you or
whatever you know, they just
have that moment and it's it's
momentous for these people their
lives our 180 degree change like
that this behemoth on our
shoulders are gone. And so it's
so not only is it modeling for
others like this can be done but
it's uplifting. It's it's
encouraging and and it that is
it is so antithetical to so much
that is already on on the
platform. And to be honest, I
wouldn't be on this platform, if
it weren't for this group,
right, yeah. So it's, it's for
me, like, I'm very proud of, of
the team, that we've been able
to do this together. And one
other thing that I just want to
add about this group, people
stay. People don't just get not
everybody stays, but a vast
majority of our people stay
after their victory post to help
others. And I'm just like, oh my
gosh, that is so gratifying. And
we're kind of building like this
PSLF little army, these PSLF
warriors, right, for good for
change, you know, helping others
along that pathway. There's so
many people I've talked to that
I met through the group, beyond
my my team, who are like, I
helped these people in real
life, I bring people home, or I
go over their student idea. And
I'm just like, fan freaking
tastic. This is like, so
gratifying. so profoundly
gratifying, like, if I think
about it, like, I get choked up
like this, this fills my heart
space, my heart well, and an
end. And all these victories
just get puts more gas in our
engines to keep forward, keep
going forward. As long as this
as long as this platform exists,
it's free and accessible, we
will be here. And even after the
waiver, even after, you know,
any other changes, we'll be
there to guide people through
it.
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: Yeah. So
one last question about the
group before turn our attention
more, more to like, how PSLF
works, and, and all of that. Who
is the group great for? And who
is it not great for? And another
way of thinking of that is? Who
should join this group? And who
should have joined this group?
Christina Ceballos: That's a
really good question. Given
that, some statistics show that
up to 25% of the US workforce,
who have student loans are
eligible for PSLF 25%. It's a
lot of people. Yeah. So this
group is for anyone who meets
that definition. Do you have? Do
you have student loans that are
not private? Do you have? Are
you working in public service,
you should consider joining. And
if anything, get on the right
side, get on the right track
now. Because the earlier you get
on track, more time you have to
fix anything that's been messed
up in your portfolio, in your
payment count in these other
things. In your repayment plan.
You can you have time to fix it
before you reach that 120 Yeah,
and actually get that credit for
that 120. So it's, it's it's
really for this very large group
of people. It's not for people
who have private student loans
only. Once you take any federal
once you take any federal
student loan, and refinance it
into a private student loan, you
erase the original, Master
Promissory Note, and you lose
access to that benefit. Okay.
Also, who should not be in this
group? This group is not for
people who don't believe in
public service, loan
forgiveness. Or detractors from
the program. Because we're a
positive group. We're not toxic,
positive. But we're definitely
here for people who are eligible
for PSLF. Because for almost 15
years, we've been misled. We've
dealt with changes, we've dealt
with misinformation. Our
commitment, first and foremost,
is to provide the most accurate
information to our members
outside the DOD and student loan
servicers. We are that third
party resource? And we're
committed to that.
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: Yeah. And
yeah, I just wanted to add in my
my pitch to, to current graduate
students who are listening, you
know, if you're planning to go
into a public service field, if
you're if you're a doctoral
student who's who's planning to
be a professor or teacher, if
you're planning to go work for a
nonprofit, or you think there's
a good chance that you might do
one of those things, right, even
if you're not sure yet. Join
this Facebook group, and just
learn stuff and be prepared for
like when that moment does come,
that you can have all of your
ducks in a row and not be, you
know, not be blindsided. 10
years later, that you can kind
of like keep things going at a
reasonable pace and make this a
more fluid process. Then, a
scary event later.
Christina Ceballos: This group
is also really for people who
work committed to self
education. We're all public
service loan forgiveness folks
generally have finished or have
some higher education. You don't
need to finish your
undergraduate degree in order to
get public service loan
forgiveness, only by virtue of
having federal student loans
makes you eligible. However, you
anyone who wants PSLF or or te
PSLF needs to be very aware of
their student loan situation,
what their career goals are, if
they're willing to stay in
public service, or, you know,
are willing to stay the course
of public service have 120
months to get PSLF. The other
thing too, is one thing about
PSLF. And having student loans,
federal student loans, the
interest rate, technically,
doesn't really matter. That
should be the farthest corner of
your mind. Because in the end,
when you get public service,
loan forgiveness or temporary
expanded PSLF, you get
everything. You know, you get
everything forgiven interest in
principle, the only time that
you should worry, quote unquote,
about interest is if you plan on
leaving public service, getting
out of income driven repayment,
and going back to standard, and
and then doing a debt snowball,
or doing an aggressive path.
That's the only time.
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: Yeah,
that's a great point. So let's,
let's, let's, let's get into the
details about PSLF. Sure. So can
you You talked a bit about it in
the last episode, can you recap
briefly the kind of history of
PSLF and how it was supposed to
work. And then some of the
hiccups along the way,
Christina Ceballos: the history
of PSLF was, is that in 2007,
under the George W. Bush
administration, and the Congress
at that time, a bipartisan bill
was put forward to establish
this program to to ensure a
steady pipeline of, of, you
know, educated folks to enter
into fields of public service,
whether it's government or
nonprofit. And once they reach
120 months of payments, the rest
of their loans are forgiven. And
these loans again, are federal
tax free. Once whatever the
balances. I don't know how it
was supposed to work back in
2007. Because we've only seen
fixes to the program and stop
gaps and things of that nature.
So in 2007, October 1 2007,
that's the effective date. All
right. 2012, or somewhere in
like, 2010, they eliminated f f
e l loan eligibility from the
program. I didn't get that memo.
I don't think I think a lot of
people didn't get the memo. In
2012, they issued the first
employment certification form.
So the program went on for
almost five years without some
kind of form to track it. All of
us public servants were like,
huh, I thought you were tracking
that for us. No, they were not.
And then and then. Somewhere in
recent more recently, I can't
remember the date, temporary
expanded public service loan
forgiveness came back came out
to help folks, public service
workers who were on the wrong
repayment plan, get credit for
those for those payments, and
it's in it's tied to a
restricted fund. There's a set
amount of money set aside for
people in this situation. I know
one person who has gotten te
PSLF. And so then that brings us
to present are almost present.
2021 2020 we have the COVID
pandemic. A lot of us public
service workers have had our
federal direct loans on pause $0
payment, zero interest occurring
since March of 2020. This has
been a blessing right? And we've
not had to recertify our income
we were just hanging out until
the pandemic either ends or the
other things happen within the
program. And the this last
installment is really to is one
of the most expansive
corrections any administration
has ever taken to fix these
wrongs. These errors. Again,
PSLF is written into our Master
Promissory Notes every student
loan borrower has this in their
documents. This is protected
under federal law. There's no
ifs, ands or buts about it. You
know, we exchange our time and
our career taking mostly Lower,
lower paying public service
jobs, to see the remaining
balance of our loans forgiven.
It is a benefit owed to us for
our service. So I'm, I'm very
pleased by the efforts, this
administration and the DOE have
taken to make this a reality. I
really hope some of it becomes
permanent. Yeah. But we'll see.
That's that's to be determined.
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: Yeah.
There's like a proposed
legislation in Congress to
basically make a lot of the
features of this waiver.
Permanent, right. Yes. Features
of it.
Christina Ceballos: Yeah. I
mean, basically make all of it
permanent, which would,
definitely, by making the waiver
permanent, which, by
congressional action, would
correct a lot of the injustices,
public service workers have
endured the past 15 years.
There's also negotiated
rulemaking. And again, I'm not a
policy wonk, I know this stuff,
high enough level, I'm not
perfect at this. So from my
understanding, negotiated
rulemaking is how the Department
of Education can kind of
navigate tweaking bits and
pieces of the program without
congressional action, and they
just closed a 30 day period of
public comments. There were
4000, submitted in 30 days,
about some of these rule
changes, some inspired by
Negotiated Rulemaking sessions
they had last quarter, or the
last quarter of 2021, but also
by the waiver. And so some of
those can possibly become
permanent, but those won't
necessarily go into effect until
next July. So what do you see
here? There's a gap between the
end of the waiver and the
limited PSLF waiver, and the
potential start of the updated
rules and practices for the
actual PSLF implementation
through Negotiated Rulemaking.
So um, I mean, there's some
logic here, right? I mean,
there's so many people who are
still just learning about PSLF.
Yeah. And we got people coming
to the group every day. They're
like, Oh, my gosh, I qualify, I
don't qualify either. Under
waiver, I'm like, I don't know,
I'm just learning about PSLF,
for the first time in this
program is almost 15 years old.
Yeah, the need is immense. The
need is immense. And so that's
why, you know, we're all
committed to staying the course.
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: So let's
turn our attention to educating
current students so that they
can be sure they're making good
choices, especially if they're
thinking about going into public
service, thinking ahead, right
to being eligible and making
sure their debt is eligible in
this in this program, what
different kinds of student loans
are out there that current
students could be taking out?
Which ones qualify would be
eligible for PSLF. Which ones
wouldn't be? So bracketing the,
the refund, the consolidation
versus refinancing question,
current students taking out new
loans? If their bank local bank
offers them alone, for for their
classes? Does that count or
parent loans? I remember they
were like Parent Plus loans when
they called my mom did one of
those for me. So what what what
works in this program, what
doesn't work in this program,
Christina Ceballos: right. And
so just to start off, in order
to qualify for PSLF, you need to
have qualifying employment with
a nonprofit or government. You
need to have qualifying loans,
the main qualifying loan type or
direct federal loans, and
there's a few different
subtypes. And then you also need
to be on a PSLF eligible income
driven repayment plan. So those
three things, they have those
three things, you're golden.
Now, there's a lot of nuance
between this. So if I were a new
student, or if I were an up and
coming graduate, whether
undergrad or graduate, and I'm
entering public service, this is
what I would do. And this is if
you're just if you've not had
any previous public service work
before, and you're new into the
job market. I would start
applying for Publix. jobs as
soon as possible. Get yourself
teed up for that. As soon as you
graduate, every single graduate,
get six months of deferment.
It's this six month period. The
only way to get out of that
deferment period is by
consolidating your loans. Okay?
If you have no previous public
service, that's okay. You're
gonna start your count is going
to start at zero anyways. So as
soon as you graduate, there,
after you graduate, go into
student aid, aka, consolidate
your loans, get into your
direct, consolidated loans, get
them all done, okay. And then,
when you're in that
consolidation, this is some of
the improvements. I have not
mentioned some of the other
improvements, there have been a
lot of improvements
studentaid.gov, where you go and
consolidate, while you
consolidate, you pick an income
driven repayment plan. The four
qualifying income driven
repayment plans are IVR ICR, our
repay R R E P A ye and pay P A,
ye, you're going to pick the
best loan for your situation, I
would stay away from ICR or go
towards paying repay just
generally, but you're gonna
you're gonna they're gonna give
you some scenarios of of what
your payment might be, you might
even be eligible for $0
repayment $0, even after the
COVID forbearance ends, and we
go back into regular repayment,
you may be paying $0, quote,
unquote. And if all you need is
that qualifying employment,
you've got a qualifying month
towards that 120. It's perfect.
Right. And then, so we talked
about the loan consolidation,
eligible employment. That's what
I
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: asked you
a question about that that
consolidation process. So. So
two things. One is, if you have
any student loans that aren't
federally subsidized, federally
backed student loans. Will those
show up in there for
consolidation to how do you
avoid accidentally bringing in
loans that that aren't going to
qualify for public service loan
forgiveness?
Christina Ceballos: That's a
great question. Any loan that is
in your student aid.gov account
can be consolidated together. If
your current student and have
taken out any private student
loans, this would come from
Sofi. This could come from Wells
Fargo, this could come from
discover places that have like,
you know, normal consumer brand
names like that, those tend to
be private loans. And you have
your most majority, vast
majority, if not 100% of the
time, the loans are in your
student aid account right now,
student aid.gov account are
eligible for consolidation into
a direct consolidation loan and
thereby will be eligible for
PSLF. If you take any any out
from other sources, they will
not be eligible and you can't
you can't consolidate private
into federal. That's That's an
impossibility.
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: And those
won't even show up in your
student aid.gov. No account.
Right. Okay. Great.
Christina Ceballos: Um, and just
just to repeat this,
consolidation is not the same
thing as refinancing,
consolidating is keeping your
loans within the federal system
within the student aid.gov
account. refinancing is taking
those student loans out of
federal the federal system,
privatizing them, yeah, you
might get a better interest
rate. But you again, erase the
master promissory note, and you
delete that option to PSLF down
the road. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm so
sorry. And you asked about
Parent Plus loans? Oh, yeah. So
Parent Plus loans are a
different beast. These are loans
that your parents or parents of
college students will take out
on their behalf to fund their
education. Now, if you're a
parent listening to this, or if
you're a student, and you know
your parents have taken out
Parent Plus loans, for your
education, first of all, thank
them, thank them, bless their
hearts, bless them, because this
is this is this is a big thing.
Parent Plus loans count for
PSLF. When the parent themselves
is in public service, and they
make that 120 months of payments
fast. It's not dependent on the
student's public service career.
So Those are very, there's a
very big distinction. I'm really
glad that you you asked that a
little bit ago, and I'm glad
that I wrote it down to come
back to it. Because, again,
Parent Plus loans. If you have
them join our group, we've got
some resources. In order, if
you're if your student in your
parent has them, you need to get
them to pay attention a little
bit to what's going on with a
waiver. Parent Plus loans, if
you consolidate Parent Plus
loans, they always will only be
eligible for income contingent
repayment ICR. That's 20% of
discretionary income, year over
year. That's a lot. And so, the
only way to get Parent Plus
loans eligible for under the
waiver is if Parent Plus loans
Parent Plus Loan holders
consolidate their own
undergraduate or their own
educational student loans
together. And then they could be
eligible for back back counts,
higher payment counts under the
waiver. It's really nuanced
thing. I don't know what
percentage of our membership
actually this applies to. And I
don't know how much of your
undergraduate students or up and
coming grad students have any of
these types of loans. But it's,
it's a big deal. So they should,
they should definitely inform
themselves on that.
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: Earlier
you mentioned, you mentioned the
employment verification forms. I
know when I went through and and
and submitted all my paperwork
for the waiver a few months ago,
right, I did all of my
employment verification forms at
once. And I was very lucky that
it was easy for me to get
signatures from HR folks at the
three institutions, I needed to
get those signatures, right. So
that was like, relatively
painless for me to do. Covering,
like 12 year plus period. I know
that's not the case for a lot of
people, especially when they're
not working for like a
university that has existed for
100 150 years, right, and has
their very strict bureaucratic
practices and record keeping in
place. I've read the I've read
stories of people who have
worked at a nonprofit that no
longer exist or changed some
significant way and they didn't
retain paperwork, and and they
have to have trouble getting
those signatures and have to
apply for essentially waivers on
the signatures. Which I'm sure
it's complicated. For people who
are who are starting out this
journey, right, who are students
who are getting ready to
graduate or graduated in a
couple of years. What should
they be doing in terms of
paperwork from the get go,
right, besides consolidating and
getting on the right kind of
repayment plan? What other
paperwork should they be holding
on to or filling out on a
regular basis, they may not be
automatically prompted to or
they might be prompted to not
know what they should be doing.
So like the employment
verification, for example, is
that an annual thing? Is that
something they should be
proactive about in some way?
Christina Ceballos: Okay. That
was a big question. So I was
trying to take notes and make
sure I captured those big
bullets. All right.
Unknown: Sorry about that. No,
Christina Ceballos: it's okay.
This is a huge part of the three
main things you need to be
eligible for PSLF. Let me start
off with this, again, repeating
is key. You don't get enrolled
into PSLF. You stay, you get
yourself eligible, and you make
yourself you remain eligible.
Let me say 420 months, yes,
there's paperwork in this is a
huge part of that paperwork. So
back in 2012, remember, they
issued the first employment
certification form, that's an
ECF. Recently, the Department of
Education updated that form to
call it the PSLF application and
temporary expanded PSLF
application. It's a huge name,
but it does one thing, or I'm
sorry, it's one name for a lot
of things. It is to certify your
employment. And it is also to
certify your last month of
employment prior. So you get to
that 120 number. So it's a few
things in one. So we still
sometimes call it ECF. But it's
it's now the PSLF application.
And you access this through the
Federal Student Aid website.
Again, your student aid.gov
account. It's called the PSLF
Help tool. You'll see our link
in it when you log in, I promise
it will be there. Now if you're
just Starting out in your in
public service, you got your
loans consolidated, so you can
start earning repayment
qualifying months from day one
out of college in your new job,
I would suggest it is suggested
to certify your income after
your first 12 months to get that
ball rolling in the system.
Because again, every month you
certify with with your loan
servicer, which will be likely
mohila. Now that the transition
is happening between federal and
Mahila, you will certify that
with mohila, once it's accepted,
your accounts will then be added
to your accounts are going to be
will see that and then those 12
months follow you forever, they
will follow you forever until
you reach that magic number of
120. At the very end, there it
is kind of a it's it's it's a
it's a ketchup payment, or it's
a ketchup count for all those
months. Currently, I work for an
employer who is amenable to
signing this PSLF application
every six months. Because for
me, I told them, I told my
employer, it would it would mean
so much to me to see my month,
my counts going up every six
months, it's a mental thing for
me. And my employer was okay
with that. So So I do submit
that every six months. Now,
let's say you have your your you
might be a few years into PSLF.
And you're just catching up
right now. And you have a couple
of years behind you that you
need to get certified. Now. What
if you can't get that signature?
Well, there is a box on the form
that says I can't get the
signature either HR won't won't
answer my phone calls returned
my emails. I I've left I've
crossed the state in the only
way to get this thing signed is
in person. There are so many
stories of people like not being
able to get that it's happened
to me, where a past employer
refused to sign my ECF at the
time. And I was like, this is a
federal benefit protected under
the law. And you're not going to
help me. It's surprising. But it
does happen even to folks like
me trying to have been involved
in aware of the program for 15
years. So I'm the last point I
want to make. Keep all of your
paperwork. I know nowadays, we
all have cloud, we have our
cloud, we have Google Drive,
we've got one drive, save a scan
of everything, at the very least
if you're able to keep the
paperwork as well, because you
may need it. In the event,
there's any error made by your
loan servicer, especially by the
loan servicers, there's been
plenty of of anecdotes in our
group of ETFs and PSLF
applications getting rejected
for the tiniest thing. So it's,
again, those are those are the
main things like you know, just
just stay on top of it, get
eligible, if you're not right
now, remain eligible, if you're
in the middle of it, and get to
that 120 Keep all your paperwork
and join our group. Join our
group.
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: And the
one other kind of paperwork that
the that I want to add to just
mention that I don't know, I
didn't think about when I was
earlier in my career, because,
you know, I didn't have a lot of
like financial literacy
training, right? As a first gen
low income, like I was easily
swayed by the interest rate
arguments for consolidating and
things like that, right. But in
addition to like, scanning,
scanning, take it to using your
smartphone to scan these
documents that you submit, right
and immediately uploading it to
Dropbox or Google Drive or
whatever, something that's
secure. Also keeping copies of
things like and this is just
like jet IQ generally good
advice, not even specific to
PSLF your tax paperwork and your
W twos because like those w two
forms, bring it back to PSLF
here, have your your employer's
employee employer identification
number on it, which is what
needs to kind of match up on
these employment verification
forms or employment
certification forms. Like and
that's how you can look up your
employer to that's like one way
to make sure you're looking at
the right employer. On the
student aid.gov website. They
added that just recently, right
they added in the ability to
just outside of the Help tool to
look up the employers and to be
sure It's an employer that is,
like, verified in their system
as a public service employer.
Christina Ceballos: Right. And
there's a caveat to that. Okay,
so you're right, like, you know,
your tax returns, you have the
EIN number, that's how you can
look up the employers on this
new newfangled tool. The thing,
the caveat is this, it's a new
tool. And they are adding more
and more eligible employers over
time. So, for example, let's say
you're working for a startup
nonprofit. And they're, they're
in the process of finalizing
their paperwork, which will be
back dated anyways. So the date
of submission, blah, blah, blah.
But if they're not in the
system, they're not likely going
to show up in that thing. In
that really wonderful tool that
they've built, nor will they
really be able to find it in the
in the PSLF. Help tool. So,
again, just keep all your
paperwork, including that tax
information. I know, just
because my mother went to
college to become an accountant,
and she did taxes for people.
She always recommended keep
seven years, I have kept all of
my years since PSLF. Started as
taking up space. It has it is
yeah, and and, but but I did all
this before, taxes were filed
online before cloud, cloud
storage and all that. So I have
a mix of a lot of paper, and a
lot of online scans and
screenshots and things like
that. The reason why we're so
we're so emphatic on this is
because Errors do happen. And
you may need escalate to other
higher ups, to get relief or get
resolution. So I don't want to
go too far down that hole. But
it's a really important thing.
This is your PSLF journey
requires a lot of it does
require self accountability,
self education, personal
responsibility. It does. It's
unfortunate, but that is just
how that system is set up.
However, there are people around
you there are people here on
Facebook, or who are in my
Facebook group, who are there to
help and clarify. And a lot of
posts already there. If you just
read through them, it'll it'll
likely your your question has
already been answered in that
group before,
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: just to
kind of close things off with
with one final set of questions.
Kind of like a bigger bird's eye
view about PSLF. And the
importance of PSLF. In
challenging stigma surrounding
it. You've alluded to a couple
of times, and I've seen I've
seen posts of of people, I mean
not to not to go too far too far
off the path here. But like
people telling stories about how
a former employer refused to
sign the certification form,
because they didn't believe in
the program for whatever reason,
right? So like, Why Is there
opposition to PSLF? And why are
those people wrong?
Christina Ceballos: There's such
intense opposition to it.
Because people don't believe
it's a thing. They don't believe
it's real. There are too many
rejections in the first few
months and years after the first
people should have been eligible
for PSLF back in 2017 and 18.
And the data keeping kept coming
at us hard and strong. It's not
working. It's not working. It's
not working. Okay, I wasn't
around when Social Security came
into existence and Medicare and
Medicaid, but I equate PSLF with
this. It's a Federal Benefits
Program. We exchange our time
and cents and commitment to
public service in exchange for
student loan debt relief. Okay,
so the opposition, I really
believe is is is unfortunately
interwoven into the larger
student loan cancellation
debate. But it is fundamentally
understandable, because it
didn't work for so long. Yeah.
And so many people had so many
problems. Now, of the folks who
are wrong about the program,
think maybe maybe they think
it's it's a handout, but I 100%
disagree with that. It is not.
I've been in public service
since 2001. Even beforehand, I
was volunteering in high school
I had a deep commitment to
serve. For as long as I can
remember I was leaving. Where
are you back when I was
considering a Uh, you know,
military service, all that say
they're wrong because it is a
it's it's law. This is law. It
was it was signed into law by
George W. Bush after it passed
both houses by a strong
bipartisan support. And it
appears that over the past 15
years, you know, there's been
this, you know, some folks
coming after PSLF I'm like,
Well, if they come after PSLF,
it's only going to affect it
would affect future public
servants, it wouldn't affect us
who have loans right now,
because it's in our promissory
notes, it would be it would be
implemented forward facing. At
the same time, if people are
coming after PSLF who's gonna
run the government's who's gonna
run the local, the county, the
state, and the federal
government's? Who's gonna run
these nonprofits? Because a lot
of the positions, I'm not gonna
say, I'm gonna venture to guess
51% of all jobs in public
service requires some higher
education. That's, I don't think
that's a far out left field.
generalization. You know, it's,
it's just, I don't know how
convincing of an argument it is.
But I'm a contracts person, it's
in black and white, it's in my
promissory note, um, do this
relief, all public service
workers who are in public
service making payments, commit
220 years? Or 120 months? Oh, my
Lord, honor 20 months? There do
that relief?
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: Yeah. So
what can people do to help keep
the program healthy, and ensure
that it doesn't get eliminated
for for future generations?
Right. Like, and I know, for a
while y'all had a, right at the
top of your Facebook group, you
had a link to, to some some
comment, commenting period that
was open for people to be able
to provide their feedback. But
like, in general, what are the
things people can do to help
make sure that this, this
program gets the support that it
that it needs, from, from from
Congress from the Department of
Education from whoever, and I'm
really
Christina Ceballos: glad you
asked that. Because deep down
inside, and this will be an open
secret. Now, deep down inside,
when I founded the Facebook
group, I wanted it to be a
vehicle for advocacy, it has
taken almost five years for us
to kind of build out those
advocacy tools. Right. And we do
have calls to action regularly
on our page group on our page
now, most recently, was
submitting public comments on
Negotiated Rulemaking. We have
an entire post with all kinds of
hyperlinks. It's called the
advocacy PSLF advocacy index,
and it's in its there in the
featured section. You can there
are templates there that my that
my team headed off headed up by
Rachel particular who who who
put together these resources, so
that we could just be like,
Okay, there's a bill, there's a
bill activate. And, and, and,
and speak your mind. There's a
lot of activity around negotiate
rulemaking. So to that end, what
can people do is get informed,
stay informed about what what
stuff's coming down the
pipeline. There are some, you
know, calls to eliminate PSLF.
Those are very, very minority.
There's a lot of calls, there's
a lot of bills right now in
Congress to make PSLF. Better.
So if you go and see these,
these activities, these actions
our congressional leaders are
taking, email them, call them
send a letter, say, I support
this, I support this. Again, we
are public servants, we are all
doing very laborious public
service work. We don't have a
lot of time to get on top of our
PSLF you know, information and
get it all current, let alone
take action. But there but there
are easy ways to do that. And we
try to we try to provide those
resources.
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: Well, and
I'll just make the pitch again
to joining the Facebook group. I
mean, that's another great
reason for even for folks like
me who've already received their
forgiveness if you're not
already a member to join that
group, so you can stay in full
warmed about what's coming down
the pike about ways that you can
get involved to help support
current and future generations
of folks who can benefit from,
from this program, and from a
better version of this program
as it improves over time. So,
Christina Ceballos: I mean,
like, social security didn't
come out and was perfect, just
like Affordable Care Act, we all
saw how Affordable Care Act came
out. It was very imperfect, you
know, in so it's like it for all
of us beneficiaries of this
benefit. Like, even once we get
the benefit, it's incumbent upon
us to ensure this is available
for other folks. And, you know,
one more thing about the group
and and benefits, we get a lot
of people kind generous people
want to send us money. Oh, it's
so like, honestly, it's like,
Oh, you're so kind. We're all
volunteers. We're all
volunteers. And, and our goal is
to provide free information. And
always keep it free. That's why
we're on Facebook, we're not
behind a paywall. Nobody should
pay for services to get PSLF
Yeah, I'm gonna say this, again,
no public servant who was
already, you know, in service
should pay for any, any
counseling to get public service
loan forgiveness, your employer
should pay for it, that would be
fantastic. You know, they should
they, you know, or at least host
webinars, invite our team. Like
we're doing that right now, we
just held a free webinar, in
partnership with Consumer
Financial Protection Bureau last
week, it's on the
website@cfpb.gov. And or
consumer finance, I'm not real
sure of the of the like, at any
rate, we're doing what we can,
we're having presentations and
other groups with Consumer
Financial Protection Bureau,
which was, I believe, our first
national level webinar, We've
also partnered with University
of Chicago, we've delivered
presentation there. So do not
pay for any services. And it is
so generous and kind for people
to offer in the group. What I
say instead is thank you so
much, when we don't take
donations, just help at least
one other person achieve PSLF
help someone else on that
journey, invite them to the
group, sit down with them and
look over their student loan
data file to kind of help them
wrap their head around it,
because it's not an easy file to
read. I know from experience,
right? So it's, it's it, I
think, I think the momentum is
building that, honestly, is
this, I don't see this program
going away anytime soon, it's
only going to get better. And it
has started to get better for
millions of people.
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: And on
that hopeful and helpful note,
thank you again for joining me
for a second episode, talking
about PSLF and the temporary
waiver and just you know,
everyone getting their ducks in
a row to make sure that they are
able to get this benefit that
when they're engaged in public
service work, that they're that
they're due, right for the for
the wonderful work that that
that they do. So thank you so
much for joining with me again,
to talk about this stuff.
Christina Ceballos: Thank you so
much, Daryl, and good best of
luck to your students and all
the people that you're going to
be with me in an impact. Again,
congratulations on your own PSLs
victory. And just very grateful
to share this time with you and
be able to get the message out
in this very, very important
time in the history of this of
this program.
Darrel Wanzer-Serrano: Awesome.
Thank you so much. Thank you.
Hey, dear listeners back for
another post recording
postscript on the episode this
week. You know, while Christina
and I were recording our
interview, the Biden
administration announced that it
was making some pretty big
changes to to student loans,
specifically announcing a
forgiveness program. Eliminating
$10,000 in student debt for most
borrowers, up to $20,000 for
those who had Pell grants. So
lots of big, big announcements
happen while we were recording
this episode. As with last
week's episode, I don't think
any of them really changed the
conversation that we had. So
there's no you know, there are
no like the corrections that
need to be made or anything like
that. But also, as with last
week's episode, I'm going to
include all the links to these
announcements in the show notes.
So be sure that you check those
out because they might very well
apply to you With all that said,
thank you listeners again for
joining us for this episode. I
really value each and every one
of you and hope that the show
helps in one way or another as
you continue your own path
navigating higher education, and
in this case student debt. Since
I tried to keep the show as
listener driven as possible,
please please, please do send
your questions to me. You can
shoot me an email at questions
at your shadow advisor.com Or
you can go to the website and
record a question that I might
air on the podcast. That's it
for this week's episode. If you
haven't already, please
subscribe to the show on Apple
podcast, Spotify or wherever you
listen to podcast. And if you're
feeling up to it, please give us
a rating and review. Thanks
again for listening in. I'll be
back with more next year.