 TITLE: How to Get a Student Loan to Help Pay for College CONTENT: Federal student loans are offered as financial aid through your school. Because they are funded by the U.S. Department of Education, federal loans come with certain benefits you won't get with private student loans.\nThat includes access to student loan forgiveness programs and income-driven repayment plans, as well as generous deferment and forbearance options.\nThe process of getting a federal student loan is relatively simple. You'll start by filling out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). With this, you'll share financial information about yourself and your family to help your school's financial aid office determine how much aid you qualify for in the form of student loans, scholarships, grants and work-study programs.\nMost federal student loans don't require a credit check, so you can even fill out the FAFSA with bad credit or no credit history. Only Direct PLUS Loans, which are available to graduate and professional students and parents, require a credit check. Even then, the government will only look for very specific negative items.\nUndergraduate students with financial need may qualify for subsidized student loans, which means the federal government pays the accruing interest while you're in school, during the six-month grace period after you leave school and during deferment periods.\nAll other borrowers will get access to unsubsidized loans, where you're responsible for all the interest that accrues on the account. Undergraduate students might also get unsubsidized loans if they don't meet requirements for subsidized loans or have maxed out the amount they can borrow.\nIf you qualify for federal student loans, the terms—including the interest rate, loan fee and repayment period—are standardized, which means everyone who qualifies for a specific type of federal loan gets the same terms. For example, subsidized and unsubsidized federal loans issued to undergraduates from July 1, 2020, to June 30, 2021, have a fixed interest rate of 2.75%. END