What if the financial aid letter your students' families are opening right now is designed, not to help them, but to steer them toward a loan they almost certainly can't repay?
That's the argument Stephen Burd is making. And he has 41 universities worth of data to back it up.
Stephen is a Senior Writer and Editor at New America, and the author of Lifting the Veil on Enrollment Management (Harvard Education Press, 2024), a book Emily has been shoving into the hands of anyone who will take it. His latest report, The Subprime PLUS Loan Crisis, dropped in February 2026 and names schools (from DePaul and Loyola to the University of Alabama) that appear to be systematically using financial aid leveraging tactics that leave their lowest-income families with Parent PLUS loans as the only way to close the gap.
The median outstanding debt for those families? Nearly $30,000. For families who may not be earning $30,000 a year.
In this episode, Emily and Steve get into all of it: how enrollment management went from a humanistic field to a cold numbers game, why the "subprime" comparison to 2008 is intentional and accurate, what the new congressional PLUS loan caps will and won't fix, and what Steve would change tomorrow if he could wave a magic wand.
This one will challenge you, whether you're in financial aid, enrollment, policy, or just someone who cares about what's happening to the families we're supposed to be serving. In this episode of The VineDown with Emily Smith:
- Why Steve calls this a "subprime" crisis and what that comparison actually means
- How financial aid leveraging produces this outcome predictably and at scale
- The three policy changes that could actually move the needle
- Why the new PLUS loan caps probably won't be enough
- What Steve would say to a financial aid officer caught between their conscience and their institution
Subscribe to The VineDown for weekly conversations at the intersection of college admissions, financial aid, and the future of higher ed.
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