Clever Magazine, Vol IV, #9 " Student Loan " (www.clevermag.com)

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Just Another Federal Student Loan

by Pete Geary

Not long ago I sat down to help my wife, Ann, fill out the application form for a Federal student loan. As with any form designed by the Federal government, it contained dozens of questions that no one in their right mind would ever think about answering honestly.

The form does, however, contain question 23.

(Important Note to College Students- Always answer question 23.)

With the help of old tax forms, our kid’s dental records, and data snatched from thin air, we worked our way through the form.

Unfortunately, we left Question 23 blank: "Have you or any member of your immediate family ever made enough money from illicit drug sales to buy the college you are applying for?"

YES NO NOT SURE, WHAT’S IT GOING FOR?

(Very Important Note to College Students - answering NO to question 23 will greatly simplify the Federal Student Loan application process.)

Unaware we had committed an egregious Federal faux pas, we signed the form and sent it off to the Federally-appointed high priests who actually make student loan decisions.

Several weeks later, we got back a copy of the application we had supplied to the government, with all of our answers typed neatly into the little boxes on the form. We didn't notice at the time that we had not answered question 23.

It was many months later, when the semester had actually started, that we became acutely aware of the fact that the school loan had not been processed.

The university's office of Revenue Enhancement called to let us know that, although they were extremely eager to allow students to take courses to further their education, technically, the school hadn't been paid. And if they didn't receive the appropriate compensation within the next 15 days, they would be forced to take back the entire educational experience.

How they would do this was something of a mystery. The only answer I could come up with was some kind of painful total mind wipe, no doubt performed late at night in the university's health center.

We immediately called the help line for Federal student loans, only to learn that they couldn't help unless we knew the ultra-secret password that the government had mailed us on a postcard several months back.

Ann and I knew that, without divine intervention, we couldn't correctly identify yesterday's mail, much less locate a postcard from months ago.

Without the password, the only solution was to fill out the entire form again, remembering this time to be absolutely certain to correctly answer question 23. Which, of course, we did.

To our surprise, when the form was finally resent, we only had to fill out about twelve questions to complete the form to the exacting standards demanded by the Department of Education.

So only about two months late, the student loan was processed, and Ann continued her college education.

During my wife's first semester in college, she was worried about fitting in with the younger students after so many years out of school.

Ann is now quite comfortable with the entire college experience, and doesn't hesitate to hold up her hand to ask the professor if some item from today's lecture will be on the upcoming test. (The correct student thinking process being: If it isn't on the test, why would you even bother to tell me about it.)

The only thing that concerns me now is that Ann seems to spend a lot of time trying to meet the people who can answer Yes to Question 23. Not that I'm really worried or anything. At least not until she starts talking about that "all important junior year abroad."

Then I may search them out myself.

Send comments to Pete: gearyp@lebonheur.org