Frederica Freyberg:
A student loan forgiveness program for minority school teachers all but dried up following limits to the program enacted two state budgets ago. In tonight’s inside look, a bipartisan effort to once again boost the Minority Teacher Loan Program, which completely forgives loans after four years of teaching, if certain requirements are met. Tonight, we talk with Connie Hutchinson, executive secretary of the Higher Education Aids Board, which administers the loan program. Thanks for being here.

Connie Hutchinson:
Thank you for having me.

Frederica Freyberg:
What were the changes that so greatly reduced the number of education majors from taking part in this loan program?

Connie Hutchinson:
Well, the program prior to the changes, you were able to teach in a school district that had I believe it was 29% minority, and that included nearly 40 school districts around the state. The change made it so that you had to teach in the Milwaukee Public Schools in order to have the loan forgiven. Additionally, there had been about $259,000 in that budget for the Minority Teacher Loan and that was cut basically in half. So I think that those two changes in the 15-17 budget really affected how many people applied for the loan.

Frederica Freyberg:
What were the effects of that, then?

Connie Hutchinson:
Well, I think that people really — you know, you had — people who are living in a place such as, let’s say, Green Bay or Shawano. And they’re going to school in Green Bay or in Stevens Point, where they have teacher education programs. To be told that in order to have this be forgiven, you have to teach in the Milwaukee Public Schools, first of all, what if they’re not hired in the Milwaukee Public Schools? There are a lot of other options. A lot of times people are not comfortable moving either from a big city to a small city or a small city to a big city. So I think that really affected the program a lot.

Frederica Freyberg:
I read that in fact, last year only one student who was studying to become a teacher, availed themselves of the program.

Connie Hutchinson:
Yes, just one person applied for the loan. And I’m not sure why it dropped so low, but it is I think — you know, we don’t have that many loans available because of the cut in the budget. And again, people are not interested in being told you have to teach in a district when you’re not even sure you can get a position there.

Frederica Freyberg:
How many different school districts, like 40?

Connie Hutchinson:
Yes. And that was with 29%. Now, with 40% minority, that will open up a lot of school districts too. And I think that we will be attracting a lot more people to get this loan. Additionally, we’ll be reaching out to the schools of education because we work with the financial aid directors. They don’t know what the degrees are that the — the students that they’re helping, they don’t necessarily know what degree, but we will be reaching out to the schools of education to let them know about these good changes.

Frederica Freyberg:
On the aims of this Minority Student Loan Program, why is it important in your mind?

Connie Hutchinson:
Well, I think it’s very important that we see — our state is very diverse. And if you’re going to school and the only people that you see are people who are Caucasian. That doesn’t show the diversity of the state. People think it’s really important for people to see — I’ve been told that this will help minority students, especially, because they can see that they could go into a teaching profession because there are people that look like them. But it’s also important for all students to see that the diversity in the state is reflected not only in their communities but in their schools and in the people who teach them.

Frederica Freyberg:
How would this work exactly? How much student loan is forgiven? How do they get that?

Connie Hutchinson:
The students apply. And they have to be already in a teacher education program. So they have to be accepted. Then they can get up to $10,000 a year with a cap of $30,000. If they teach in the school district, I think it’s $5,000 a year that is forgiven, they can get all of that loan forgiven.

Frederica Freyberg:
Do you feel as though there isn’t a lot of awareness about this program?

Connie Hutchinson:
I think the awareness dropped significantly after the changes were put in place. And also it was kind of confusing for the people who are doing the loans out in the schools, the financial aid professionals, because there was a big change. So it was difficult for them to really be — to, say, direct their students to take out these loans because you probably could get a job in Milwaukee. So that’s not a good way to talk to students about — good information for the financial aid directors to have.

Frederica Freyberg:
But again, this is kind of a bipartisan effort to boost this program.

Connie Hutchinson:
It is. It’s a total bipartisan effort. And I really appreciate Representatives Fields and Loudenbeck working together on this. They were the ones who brought it to our attention. We were not the ones who initiated the changes so having this as a bipartisan bill, I think, is very helpful in getting it passed. And also will help us to make sure that we get the correct information out there.

Frederica Freyberg:
We’ll be tracking it. Connie Hutchinson, thanks very much.

Connie Hutchinson:
Thank you.

Frederica Freyberg:
The Minority Teacher Loan Program affords loans to some 13 education majors annually.