It seems easy to get student loans, as shown by the enormous levels of debt today’s scholars are accruing.

However, the poor Americans special loan and scholarship programs who are suppose to be the primary beneficiaries of this system, are the ones most often missing out. 

Via Instapundit:  In the Atlantic, Sarah Carr describes the labyrinth surrounding scholarships and admissions that hurt poor families.

One spring afternoon, O. Perry Walker High School Principal Mary Laurie made her way to the school’s courtyard, where a lone student sat at a picnic table with a large stack of papers in front of him and a frustrated look on his face. Laurie recognized the student as a shy senior with one of the highest GPAs in his class.

The documents, it turned out, were all from Tuskegee University. Tuskegee had accepted the 18-year-old, offering him a full scholarship. But they required a $500 deposit within the next few days if he wanted to secure his spot. The student had no idea what to do.

“If that’s where you want to go, let me know,” Laurie said. “I’ll try to get the five hundred dollars.”

The student said nothing.

“You want to go to college, baby?” Laurie asked gently.

The young man nodded and wandered off, a confused look on his face.

If one of Walker’s top students was struggling to navigate the college-admissions and financial-aid maze, Laurie worried about how less-motivated students were faring. Earlier that winter, she had decided Walker needed to do a better job helping its students sift through the process. Now she saw how far the school still had to go.

Walker employed two college counselors, but they had their hands full helping caseloads of hundreds. Laurie wanted someone to create a comprehensive data system so the school knew, at any given moment, how many of its students had taken the ACT, been accepted into colleges, and qualified for the state’s main college scholarship program, known as TOPS.

Data had not always been Walker’s strongest suit. More intangibly, Laurie hoped to do a better job ensuring “everyone was speaking the same language” when it came to college admissions and financial aid….

Creating a data system was the easy part, even though new information about college acceptances, ACT scores, and grade point averages poured in daily. Translating the “language of college” proved far more difficult. The labyrinthine rules and processes surrounding scholarships, loans, and financial aid did not account for the messy realities of poor families’ lives.