WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senator Angus King (I-Maine) released the following statement today in response to a new study that found that high school students in America last year did not claim up to $2.7 billion in federal financial aid. According to the study, the money, which averages out to nearly $2,000 per student, went unclaimed due in large part to incomplete or unsubmitted FAFSA applications, leaving students in greater debt when they graduate.

            “It’s a real shame that the very program intended to help students afford college has become so complicated that, instead of filling out the application, they’d rather just shoulder the costs,” Senator King said. “We need to knock down the bureaucratic hurdles that stand between students and the federal aid their eligible for, and the first step should be simplifying the FAFSA process because when students graduate with a mortgage-sized debt it’s harmful to their future and it hurts our economy.”

The study underscores the need for the FAST Act, bipartisan legislation introduced last year by Senator King, Senator Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), who is the Chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, and several other colleagues, that would simplify the process of applying for and receiving federal financial aid to attend college, allow the year-round use of Pell Grants, discourage over-borrowing, and simplify student loan repayments.

The bill would reduce to a single postcard – called the “Student Aid Short Form” – the questions 20 million Americans must answer to apply for federal financial aid each year and inform high school students in their junior year of the amount they can expect to receive in federal aid to help pay for college. It would also address the problem of some students borrowing more money than they need to cover college expenses, and simplify the options students have to repay their federal loans.  The act also streamlines federal grant and loan programs to better serve more students more effectively. Senator King has also introduced separate bipartisan legislation, the Repay Act, which would dramatically simplify the current maze of student loan repayment programs.

Today is also the first ever “National Student Debt Day.” In 2013, Senator King joined a small, bipartisan group of his colleagues in solving the student loan crisis that threatened to hike loan interest rates to new highs. As a result of the compromise they brokered, student loan interest rates last year dropped from 4.66 percent to 4.29 percent, saving borrowers billions of dollars in interest.

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