How Do I Consolidate My Child's Student Loan?

If your child has a bundle of different loans from college, you may think, "I'd like to consolidate my child's student loan."
This can be a good idea, if you do it properly and at that right time.
Do You Qualify?
The first information to gather when you wonder, "How will I consolidate my child's student loan?" is information that tells you if you qualify for loan consolidation.
The student must be out of school (enrolled half time or less) in order to qualify for consolidation. You need to be in the grace period of the loans (the months between leaving school and when you must start making loan payments) or you must be actively paying on the loan and be current on your payments.
If these circumstances do apply to you, then you can consider consolidation.
Federal Loan Consolidation
The next consideration is the types of loans your child has. If you have federal student loans, then all of them can be consolidated into one loan.
When you're trying to consolidate my childs student loans, you can consolidate into one single loan if all of the loans are FEELP loans. These include Stafford -- an extremely common type of loan - PLUS, SLS, FISL, Perkins, Health Professional Student Loans, NSL, HEAL, Direct Loans and Guaranteed Student Loans. All of these are different types of federally guaranteed loans.
The government has a division that handles consolidation of Federal loans, and they set the interest rate for the consolidated loans.
When you consolidate the loans guaranteed by the Federal government, they figure the interest rate by creating a weighted average of all the interest rates, then rounding up 1/8 of a percent. This rate is capped at 8.25 percent.
The rates on most Federal loans are reasonable, particularly when compared to the going rate for borrowing, so the interest rate on a consolidated loan is generally reasonably low.
The application for a Federal consolidation loan is online. While you can download it and mail the application in, this process takes much longer to complete than the online application with an electronic signature.
Private Student Loans
If you have private student loans, you may still want to consolidate, but don't try to do so with your child's federal loans. A loan consolidation with private student loans is similar to consolidating credit card debt or any other type of personal debt.

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Charter Schools Consolidate Into School System

ROGERS — A new era will begin for two Rogers charter schools at midnight June 30.

At that time and date the school boards for the elementary Benton County School of the Arts and the Northwest Arkansas Academy of Fine Arts high school will dissolve and the Founding Board of both schools will become the school board. It will be a new school system known as Benton County School of the Arts K-12, said Paul Hines, superintendent of the Benton County School of the Arts.

The Benton County School of the Arts school board met for the last time Thursday to approve a technology bid to rework the technology infrastructure at the school and to approve a motion to dissolve the board one second before midnight June 30. At the stroke of midnight the Founding Board will become the school board for the consolidated school systems known as the Benton County School of the Arts under a single charter.

The Northwest Arkansas Academy of Fine Arts will surrender it's charter to the state and will become the Benton County School of the Arts High School, Hines said.

The state Board Of Education approved the consolidation of the two charter schools and a refinancing plan earlier this month. This is the first time two charter schools have consolidated under one charter, according to Julie Johnson Thompson, public relations officer for the Department of Education.

Members of the Founding Board met for four minutes in a special session Thursday to appoint a superintendent for the school system minutes after the Benton County School of the Arts School Board concluded its meeting.The Founding Board appointed Hines to be the superintendent of the consolidated school system.

The refinancing plan extends the length of repayment of the $3.8 million in current debt between the two schools. Pinnacle Hills Bank agreed to extend two loans, one for $900,000 and one for $2.9 million from the original payoff date in 2012 to 2037, according to the board.

The idea for the merger of the charter school surfaced in April, said Craig Brown, president of the Founding Board.

"With two different charters operating under one founding board it got pretty muddy," Brown said. "If the elementary school wanted to use the performing art theater at the high school they had to rent it."

Howard Alsdorf, founding board member added it was hard for the two schools to work together.

"A lot of options were considered," Brown said, "and this was the best. Now the finances can be co-mingled benefiting both schools."


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