The U.S. Department of Education had millions of phone calls from families to its call center go unanswered and had technical glitches plague its student-aid application processing.
Nearly 75% of calls seeking help went unanswered more than five months, and understaffed call-center representatives told families to “try again later” in what was part of a series of glitches of the new Free Application for Federal Student Aid program, according to a government watchdog agency.
Last week, Government Accountability Office experts Marisol Cruz Cain and Melissa Emrey-Arras offered devastating testimony before the House Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Development.
They exposed glaring failures in the Biden-Harris administration’s rollout of the Free Application for Federal Student Aid—a mess that could have been avoided had the Department of Education been focused on its core responsibilities instead of pushing for student loan cancellation.