February 18, 2026 • 48 mins
Student loans have been a source of stress for many of us—but with recent policy changes, shifting repayment requirements, and proposed funding cuts to certain graduate programs, that stress has reached a new level. From confusion about repayment restarting, to fears about forgiveness programs disappearing, to conversations about “reclassifying” degrees like nursing, psychology, and social work, there’s a lot of information circulating—and not all of it is accurate.
To help us sort through what’s really happening and what we can actually do about it, I’m joined by Dr. Sonia Lewis, also known as The Student Loan Doctor. Dr. Lewis is a financial expert who has helped tens of thousands of borrowers navigate repayment, forgiveness, and financial strategy.
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The Therapy for Black Girls Podcast is a weekly conversation with Dr. Joy Harden Bradford, a licensed Psychologist in Atlanta, Georgia, about all things mental health, personal development, and all the small decisions we can make to become the best possible versions of ourselves.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
Welcome to the Therapy for Black Girls Podcast, a weekly
conversation about mental health, personal development, and all the small
decisions we can make to become the best possible versions
of ourselves. I'm your host, doctor joy hard and Bradford,
a licensed psychologist in Atlanta, Georgia. For more information or
(00:32):
to find a therapist in your area, visit our website
at Therapy for Blackgirls dot com. While I hope you
love listening to and learning from the podcast, it is
not meant to be a substitute for a relationship with
a licensed mental health professional. Hey, y'all, thanks so much
(00:57):
for joining me for session four fifty one of the
Things for Black Girls Podcast. We'll get right into our
conversation after word from our sponsors. Student loans have always
been a source of stress from many of us, but
(01:18):
with recent policy changes shifting repayment requirements and propose funding
cuts to certain graduate programs, that stress has reached a
new level. From confusion about repayment restarting, to fears about
forgiveness programs disappearing, to conversations about reclassifying degrees like nursing, psychology,
and social work. There's a lot of information circulating and
(01:41):
not all of it is accurate to help us or
through what's really happening and what we can do about it.
I'm joined by doctor Sonya Lewis, also known as a
Student Loan Doctor. Doctor Lewis is a financial expert who
has helped tens of thousands of borrowers navigate repayment, forgiveness,
and financial strategy. What began as her answering questions after
(02:02):
church has grown into a seven figure consulting business with
coaches around the world. If something resonates with you while
enjoying our conversation, please share with us on social media
using the hashtag TVG in session, or join us over
in our Patreon to talk more about the episode. You
can join us at community dot therapy for Blackgirls dot com.
Here's our conversation. Well, thank you so much for joining
(02:29):
us today, doctor Lewis.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
I would love for you to tell us more about
how you got into the work that you're doing supporting
families with financial aids.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
So this work begun two thousand and fifteen in Philadelphia, PA.
That's where I'm from. I was really on a journey
trying to figure out my own financial situation as it
relates to just becoming an adele understanding student loans. And
also that's my professional background. And I took a financial
literacy course at church and what I realized and this
(03:00):
course was there was no one to really talk about
student loans or what to do with them. And so
because that's what I have already been doing professionally, at
that point, I said, well, I can help people and
teach them after class at the church, having lines of
people coming in for a consultation that I never said
I would give. But we're in the house of the Lord,
(03:21):
so how because you not? And then I said, oh okay,
I said, well, if people are willing to come, I said,
they could pay me for my time. We could meet
at corner bakery. I feel like every great business starts
at a bakery somewhere with the plug and Wi Fi.
And then sometimes you have to flirt to get the
table with the plug. But it's all right. So that's
how it went for like the first six months. I
(03:41):
didn't know any better. I was just trying to charge
an hour when I got paid at work, because there's
no concept of where you're supposed to be paid as
a business owner and then I was like, I think
I need to go up with my prices. I need
a row office. Long story short, I was able to
growing into well technically it's a seven figure business now
consulting business, and I have coach all over the world,
but it really just started with me answering and helping
(04:04):
people at the church. So here we are today, yea.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
And I would imagine that you have seen so much
in terms of how the landscape has changed from year
to years. Are there some major themes that you feel
like have come up in your work with your students
or with your clients, and you've been maybe your coaches
and their clients that you think are important to kind
of highlight. I think that every administration has a different
tone of how they handle student loan repayment, and so
(04:28):
we brace ourselves because I've now been through a few
administrations with this and unfortunately right now the timing of
this podcast where it is miss stuff just making sure
that people understand that this administration they won't require you
to pay, They're going to not make things so easy.
We're coming off of a five year repayment pause because
of the pandemic, so there's a lot of anxiety there's
(04:50):
a lot of unknown There's a lot of unclear and
not true information circulating around too that we try to
clear up for people. But we know that student loans
lives in the middle really of everything, financial health, emotional health,
just even.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
How people interact with their personal relationships. If I get married,
do I have to tell my partner about my student loans? Yes,
it shows up later it's time to go buy a
home together. So depending on what they come to the
table with will depend on the problem that we're tackling.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
Yeah, so it sounds like a lot of the questions
recently have been around like repayment, right, Like, whereas you know,
in the past couple of years, we've had a little
bit more laxed, a little bit more leeway, And you're saying,
now with this administration, folks really should be focusing on, Okay,
how do I actually start to repay these loans?
Speaker 2 (05:40):
Yeah, because if you don't, they will. So what I'm
telling everyone is that the process of repayment has started, right.
A lot of people didn't know that, which is okay.
Over half of them have started repayment, but over half
of them didn't know. You only find out when your
credit score drops or when you go to make a
big purchase and then it shows up. So people are
(06:01):
really surprised that. And I think that there was like
this thing that people were going to be notified that
that repayment was happening. They're not notifying anyone.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
And so you mentioned that you feel like there's also
a lot of misinformation out there, maybe about the repayment
process or maybe about the process of getting loans in general.
Can you clear up maybe some of those nets or
bad information that you've heard out there. So a change
that was recently announced with this administration was that they're
going to be reclassifying or declassifying certain programs that really
(06:33):
put people on the uproar because it feels like a
personal attack, like, what do you mean my nursing degree
is not professional? Right, we'll use that field for example.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
Technically, what the administration was saying is that certain fields,
because of the return on investment from a student loan perspective,
did not pay out as well as others over the years.
I think this administration did not lead properly with we
are declassified or we classify in certain fields because there's
(07:02):
a high default rate. If the administration would have led
with numbers. I think people could understand numbers better than
just you're not a professional. I think that there was
an opportunity to educate people instead of like penalizing them.
But here we are. So that's one big change. You
have to know for those listening that are going to
go back to grad school or just in general go
(07:23):
to college, or they have family members, or if someone's
listening to their child's about to go to school, if
your child wants to be let's say, a teacher or
a nurse, the question is there enough funding to take
them all the way through? Therapists are including this too.
There's a lot of people business owners like for nbas
is there enough funding to take you all the way
(07:44):
through to complete your degrees at a master's or a
doctoral level? So should you choose right? That's first big
change because if not, that requires people to say we're
gonna need scholarships, were gonna need grants, We're going to
need to help our child pay for school. The second
big thing is they're eliminating some repayment plans, So now
we have to make sure that people are educated on Okay,
(08:06):
this is what repayment looks like. This is what you're
going to be required to pay all your credit score
is going to drop. We want people also to be
aware that forgiveness programs still exists, they're still around. The
problem with that, though, is that the funding for forgiveness programs.
I want to use an example like Barber's defense. If
you went to a school that was a for profit
(08:29):
school like University of Phoenix or DeVry, you're eligible to
get some of those loans or all of those loans forgiven.
The challenge with that is that after July they can
take some of that funding away. So in our space,
we're trying to educate the new person coming in, we're
educating the person that's in, and then we're educating the
person that doesn't yet know about forgiveness programs they're eligible for.
(08:51):
So every day we're kind of like in three headspaces
with our clients. Just depending what the person has going on,
we kind of see what part of the conversation they
need to deal with first. Does that answer your question?
Because there's so many things.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
Be does and I have a lot of follow up
questions that I'm sure will also help to kind of clarify.
So one you just mentioned that like people are in
three different phases, right, Like they are coming into the system,
they're currently in, or they're like kind of out and
still figuring out. Like what the repayment options are, So
student loans, I'm wondering they do not work on like
you follow the guidelines that were set when you answered
(09:23):
the program. Right, So if I like got loans ten
years ago, and like the rules were that, you know,
I had ten years to pay it back or whatever,
does that change with every administration? Or am I locked
up or whatever I signed at the time I signed it.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
I'm going to answer this question professionally. People signed a
promisary note, you can't do that. They're like, okay, take
it back. So to answer your question, in general, that
is not legal to do. So I always say, we
don't know what this administration, what day, and what hour
you'll get. So to answer your question, if you signed
up for student loans ten years ago, there's a promisary
(09:56):
note in which you will abide by those terms are
still so relevant today.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
God very okay, perfect, Like you said, in general, right,
because we don't know what could be happening tomorrow. So
the next question, and I definitely want to spend more
time talking about this. I am trained as a psychologist,
so there has been lots of conversations in the mental
health states around this, like declassifying and changes in classification
to things like psychology, nursing, social work. This is the
(10:23):
first time I'm actually hearing it put the way that
you put it, and so I do agree that you
know that is the messaging that maybe could have let it.
But I think for a lot of people this has
felt very targeted, right because we also know that this
is a space where we find lots of black women,
right like in the helping professions. I'm curious if these
seals are the ones that you're saying are not having
like a high return on investment, what feels actually had
(10:47):
a higher return on investment in terms of the ones
that maybe are still classified as professional.
Speaker 2 (10:52):
So when we talk about the reclassification, we know that
historically students entering these fields that we're targeted are coming
from a people of color, working class families, first generation backgrounds, right,
you name it, and so there's already financial barriers there.
And so what we're seeing is that when we looked
at the data, like let's just talk about data, the
(11:13):
data show that students that completed degrees, particularly not so
much at the bachelors of I do want to stress
that though, and the masters in the doctoral level had
a higher default and less repayment rate. Now, there could
be a lot of things that we could really dive into, right,
and now we're talking about adults too. We're having trouble
with prioritizing repayment. And so this administration said, and I
(11:38):
don't agree with this, by the way, I'm just saying
data data shows that there were high default rates in
these areas, but it also could be that there just
could be a lack of understanding money, understanding how student
loans work, understanding repayment options. And I want to say this,
a lot of these programs are really expensive. So doctor Joy,
(11:59):
what I always like the answer here is that don't
make just the student or the barrower accountable. Make the colleges,
the universities accountable. Why are these programs six figure programs?
So then when someone comes out they're going into the
field of psychology, for example, everyone's not starting off with
six figure salaries.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
Most people are not.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
But they borrowed it, right, Yeah, So the problem is
is that it's not a good investment in terms of
money wise, that we would say, okay, borrow two hundred thousand,
but you're only going to get paid fifty. But when
we talk about fills that are on track with repaying
their loans, let me say this too. This administration has
taken away a lot of data driven websites. So my
(12:43):
background is that I was studying how African American women
were impacted by Loan Day. So there were websites that
I would use to pull on for data like this
because that's what I will study it and my doctoral degree. Girl,
they're going now. So what I will tell you to
be true is when we think about someone that is
going to be agnor well, they probably won't take that
financial funding away from them because the school won't comply
(13:05):
with changing their prices. See what I'm trying to say
is that this is a big problem with our entire ecosystem.
The education system is so messed up that why are
we allowing schools to charge this amount of money? Then
people have to borrow this amount of money. This administration
does not believe in federal funding period. This administration believes
that funding should come from states or private So when
(13:28):
we saw them pull what I call a chess move
and say, hey, we're going to take some funding away
from these degrees. What they want people to do doctory
let's not forget who makes money from this when they
leave office. They want you to go to a local bank.
Let's say go to a local P and C. And
they want people to apply for a private loan at
(13:49):
P and C. Now we know that credit is not
treated fairly amongst black and brown women specifically, so then
there could be what denials. I see your question directly
by saying that there isn't necessarily a published site that
shows the programming of who are paying back their loans, right,
It's just that they honed in on these particular fields
(14:10):
which historically affect people of color, particularly women.
Speaker 1 (14:15):
More from our conversation after the break, and I think
it is a conversation around the larger ecosystem of care
because you mentioned like, oh, they're probably not going to
take away funding from people who are going to medical school,
(14:36):
for like the neurosurgeons. But the neurosurgeon can't do his
work if the nurse is not available to also of this.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
It's right here.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
Well, so it does feel like this weird ranking which
I think is always a conversation in the medical space, right,
see six people in an hour. A social worker is
only seeing one person in an hour, right, and so
the rates are already not the same, and so it
is a larger conversation I think around just the hierarchy
that exists both in the mental and medical se but
also then what does that mean in terms of care
(15:03):
for our community? Because we know when there are more
black therapists, like social workers, black nurses, then we are
also typically working or at least a higher rate of
us are working in spaces where our community is also serviced, right,
And so that means I think a lack of care
or the level of care and consideration that we would
be expecting for our community to be able to get.
Speaker 2 (15:23):
So, doctor Joe, I could trigger with this conversation a
couple of ways, right, because as a black woman, when
the information first came out, I was all in my feelings,
let's just I'm human. I was like, oh wait a minute.
Then I'd put my scholar head on. Okay, they had
put a scholar head on. And then I started doing
some data research just to kind of see what they
were saying. And something I think that was important to
come out was that it wasn't just about any particular profession,
(15:44):
although we know who it impacts the most. It was
really re evaluating the program and the borrowing limits because
of the data. Just the money part of alone, right,
And when I look at what I do, I've helped
over fifty thousand people collectively with my team, and if
I could be honest with you, yeah, these fields have
a higher borrower and default rate. I have data that
(16:06):
shows it just in my back end. Now let's just
put that on the table and say that this doesn't
make people bad people, and I mean paid enough to
pay back what they borrow. But we still need these
people in these fields and professions. But then doctor Jorie
put another hand on and this is just me personally
moving into a more philanthropic stage in my life. I
think about what we really need our community to start
(16:27):
being community, Like we really need to start looking at
where are our dollars going and how can we support
students in these fields, Like where could my dollar be
better served at in terms of scholarship money. Now, I
also want to demystified in this season that everyone listening
could do a scholarship back to one person at their church,
(16:49):
their high school, their college, to help our next nurse,
to help our next therapist, our next psychologists. And it
really is going to have to start to look like
that because I just think that the funding window federally
is going unless we get some change of administration, it's
going to get smaller, more restrictive, more biased. And then
(17:10):
I think that we're going to have to really call
on bigger entities like with the NAACP does right, our
churches are going to have to be more targeted with
the students in our community, our community members such as
you and I. Could we have a scholarship for the
therapy for black girls. And I think that's where I'm
leaning into because sometimes there are problems that are just
(17:33):
bigger than us. The first question I just asked myself
when all this came out is well, what can you do?
Speaker 1 (17:37):
So?
Speaker 2 (17:38):
I know what I can do as a professional. I
can on my platform, I still long doctor platform. I
can educate, I do free classes every Monday. Anyway, I
maybe I do some more right, Maybe I could and
actually not. Maybe what caused me to do this was
when this news came out, I reached out to a
lot of specific platforms like those that do, for example,
with nursing, and I said, hey, I want to go
(17:58):
to a hospital and see a black nurse. That's what
I want to see. I want to work with black therapists.
I want my dinnis black. Like I'm really very selective.
That's what I want. But if I want that, then
I got to support that too. And so now, see,
doctor Jerry, I got to open up the ecosystem. Now
we got to open up the community. We really in
(18:18):
this country, we have an education problem, down to investing
in ourselves, down to let's not support these institutions that
are costing this much money. Why don't we support our
community in state colleges more. We got to destigmatize that
you went to a community or state college. You should
go there, right because it's the same teacher teaching. Hear
it and I lead school at the same day. And
(18:41):
then as a community, what can we start doing within
our own communities. I know this year, doctor Joy, I
gave a lot of money to my high school, and
I'm committed to giving more to my high school and
to my college. That's where my giving between that times
in the community. That's what I'm doing because that's the
only thing I could think that would make me feel
(19:01):
better about investing in the future of the landscape of
these professions. Okay, I'm answering your question in several ways
because I'm a woman, a black woman, you a practitioner dollar.
This is a huge, huge problem, and I don't want
this conversation to be it. So I appreciate you asking
these questions because I don't want this conversation to be
(19:24):
swept under the rug because it's not a headline anymore
because someone's listening their kids or their cousins.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
Or their We're in that window right now, like people
are getting their acceptances and yeah, so this is the
time to really start thinking about it. So when does
this like new law go into effect, doctor Lewis, So
at what point is this.
Speaker 2 (19:42):
It's still got if right?
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Okay, so it's still it's not official yet. This is
just something on the table.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
Let me say something about this administration, Honey. They can
put out something like it's done. I need the laws,
like I mean, but it doesn't matter because he's not
really following the laws and rules as it's written. Pull
out your chat GPT. It matters because when we have
mid term elections and we have bigger elections at large
because we know that these things aren't law yet we
(20:08):
can still have things in place to change them. It
does matter. And I'm glad you said that because you
could feel listening or seeing headlines like it's right here
and then you can check out. I'm telling you almost
to me, So I'm telling everyone listening to check back in.
You can still enforce change. So they're proposing for these
changes to occur as of July first, like there are
(20:28):
opportunities with really just at our local, our state government
that impacts what happens even on federal levels. So yes,
to your point. When this administration shares things, I'm saying
this for everyone listening, it could feel like that's it.
That's how they drop announcements these days. I ain't see
nothing about it. Now you will think that there's no
(20:49):
judicial process. What I do appreciate is that there are
still judges and there are still courts that are cutting
this stuff down the side. They put out an announcement
and then you got to stay with the news, right,
you got to see that the courts over said, no,
overrided it. No Congress stepped in. So I'd be like, Lord,
thank you for letting somebody be there normal.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
So that feels like it could be like an intervention
point is to actually, like when you talk about writing
letters to Congress or getting on the phone and calling
your congress son, this is an opportunity because this is
not something that has been signed into lawduss, Well, I do.
Speaker 2 (21:21):
I can even share with your team what I share
out on my Monday classes of how they can get
into contact with people who would make a change in
this space. So yes, I'll get that information over to
you guys, because we can still do something and you
have to be annoyingt and you have to call, and
you have to be documenting, but you still have to
be professional, like we don't want a bunch of people
calling up there customing you know, things of that nature. Literally,
(21:44):
I gave my students a script what to say, what
to do, hang up? Yeah, okay. Change.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
So it sounds like, you know, this is changing the
ways that you're having conversations with your students about maybe
would they even want to pursue? Right, So, if I'm
somebody who has dreamed of being a psychologist and now
maybe I find with this, you know, maybe proposed change,
I have to think about funding differently, right, because I
know for a lot of people psychologists specifically, like there
was a forgiveness program and you may know more about
(22:13):
this ten years than your loans were forgiven. And that's
something that's also on the shopping block as a potential
that's going to go away.
Speaker 2 (22:22):
There's a program called Public Service Loan Forgiveness, yes, and
it doesn't necessarily have to be rural. It just has
to be a nonprofit or not for profit. That program
did not get clipped or cut. That is still through Congress.
So I need everyone listening to know that there are
two types of programs, a Congress program and a Department
of Education program. Department of Education programs can be changed,
(22:42):
clip cut, modified per administration. Public Service Loan Forgiveness is
a Congress program. So we're good.
Speaker 1 (22:49):
More from our conversation after the break. But I do
think Stilvi, it's back to my original point of you know,
I think this could lend itself to people thinking differently
about like what kinds of things they want to pursue
(23:10):
in terms of career. Because you mentioned you haven't seen
it so much kind of getting cut at the bachelor's level,
but a lot of these programs that you're talking about.
There's very little that you can do with a bachelor's
in psychology, right, like you have to get a master
that leads to be able to practice and stuff. And
so what kinds of conversations are how are you helping
your students think through.
Speaker 2 (23:29):
A lot of our clients are already done with school.
So I bring these conversations to our platform because we
were working with a lot of parents and a lot
of people who are investing in their loved ones that
are going to school. To answer your question, what I
would advise anyone listening that's think about going to school
for their masters or their doctoral degree, Let's just make
sure we have enough funding to be able to cover it,
(23:50):
because they cut out what's called grad plus funding, which
is very significant to pay for your master's or doctoral
level degrees. Also, the thing is someone could still go
for a master's or a doctoral degree, but it's probably
going to require them to work and go to school.
(24:10):
So before you could just do one or the other
because there was enough funding to support your lifestyle while
you were in school. But now it's not the case.
And I want to also say this, can we find
someone else to pay for school. Can we find an
employer to help us pay because there are employers that
will help you pay for write offs too, And that's
one thing I think this is underutilized. I've often seen
(24:31):
people get a master it's not really doctoral degree, but
a master's and then not even work in the field,
Like why do we take this degree on? So we
need to make sure that people have a clear understanding
before borrowing at this level what it is that they
want to do in the world. Too. This is not
the season to enroll and then figure it out. This
(24:52):
is the season to have things pretty already figured out
and then wrong? Am I saying that right, doctor Jory?
Because you know if this happened to you, but it
happened to me in my undergrad In my undergrad I
was a psychology major, Yes I was. I got to
my junior year, I tell you, and I could not
pass the class called methods. I had to the staff
(25:13):
cuss yet methods. And then there was another class I
couldn't pass. It was too I had to keep a
rat alive. What was that class called?
Speaker 1 (25:21):
Oh, experimential psychology? Uh huh.
Speaker 2 (25:23):
I couldn't pay it, can't pass it. And I was
on a scholarship too, and they were about to take
my scholarship because I couldn't pass a class, and I said,
may not be for me, So then I had to pivot.
My bachelor's is in anthropology, but the core of it,
what I really really wanted to be, doctor Joy was
a teacher. But there was a negative connotation that teachers
don't make money. All the people in my family are teachers.
(25:46):
But I think that I wish that there was an
opportunity to have some more coaching career coaching for myself
at that point around what did I want to be
or do before going into college. So I'm using the
story to say anyone listening to has children, family members,
we have to sit our young people down and ask
them what do you want to be? What would make
you happy before just allowing our students to just blindly
(26:10):
study and figure it out. It's a hard thing is
the times are changing. There's not an infinite amount of
money anymore to be able to just kind of figure
stuff out.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
Yeah, yeah, it does feel like because I think historically,
you know, college is a time where you explore, right, like,
I don't know what I want to do. That's why
you take a bunch of stuff, right, and you're saying
the landscape has changed so much that it's expensive to
try to explore like at that point, right, Like the
exploration almost has to happen ahead of time before you
spend a bunch of money pursuing something that's not going
to be a good bail for you.
Speaker 2 (26:40):
Yeah, internships can help with that. Pre college experience can
help with that. I would rather someone go to a
community college before a traditional college to alleviate costs with that.
There has to be a way to explore without putting
out all of that cost because that money is so
short now that that pool of money is no longer
(27:02):
available like it once was.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
You mentioned doctor lewis an option, and I would love
to hear other things maybe that you share with your
students in terms of looking at like employers who will
sometimes help you to pay for the cost of schooling.
Are there other creative things that people should be exploring
that maybe they're not aware of in terms of finding
other entities to pay for a school.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
Well, I think that let's just go back to employment.
You ever look at your employment policy and they say
that they'll help you with tuition reimbursement. You know, you
can propose to your lawyer, and I don't have it
in front of me, so just use chat, GPT or
you know, just find this out. But you could take
that same policy and ask them for student loan reimbursement.
(27:44):
Employers are able to reimburse student loans the same way
they give up front for tuition, but people don't think
to ask that because it's not a common practice. But
I dare someone listening to have a meeting with your
manager and say, I see that there is a tuition
re imbursement policy, but what's missing is a student loan
(28:06):
re imbursement policy. Is there any way that could be
consider if I was able to show proof that I'm
paying on my student.
Speaker 1 (28:11):
Loans, doesn't hurt this questions there.
Speaker 2 (28:14):
This is actually something that's in the text code that
allows employers to do this. And when I found this out,
I was like, oh wow. I was like, I wonder
why more employers don't use it as a tool for hiring.
So we just have to access number one. Number two,
doctor joy, something I've done in my real life. Anyone listening,
did you all just starting to negotiate in some things
(28:35):
in your raises and your bonuses when you are please
don't do this if you're not the best at your job. Okay,
so that's my carry. I got to be sharp. So
I was really really good when I was working at
the college, and I can say that when complained about it.
I really love my job. And I realized that the
metrics that were set up for bonuses and raises that
(28:57):
were just a little low for me. And I was
doing the work of like two or three reps. I
was working in college admissions, and I just simply asked,
I said, hey, listen, just wondering if there's a space
for a couple extra thousand for my bonus this year,
said my student loan payments have gone up. That was
my sact words. I just asked. But I was really
(29:18):
good at my job, and I said, please don't answer now.
I say, if you want to mean about it and
get back to me. I'm laughing because that was a
lot of audacity in my twenty something years alife. But girl,
my payments went up. I needed to acts right, and
they came back and say yes. So I don't know.
I'm just saying some unconventional conversations might need to happen
(29:38):
this season because employers want to retain good talent, right, Okay,
So if someone's listening that's not eligible for public service
on forgiveness and they already do charitable good work and
they want to have their own nonprofit, Like, don't just
start a nonprofit for the sake of getting your loans forgiven.
But if you have a nonprofit or you're starting one
(30:00):
and you have a board, you've taken the time to
formalize it legally and you're compliant, your board member could
sign off for you to get credit towards public service
loan forgiveness. So there are quite a few thousand people
we've helped with this. What I appreciate is I know
that we impact change because I noticed that the studentad
dot gov website started changing their verbiage around what to
(30:22):
do if you have your own nonprofit and how to
be compliant. I was like, I know we impacted some
things in the world. You get tell me nothing. But anyway, Also,
at this time, we were doing a lot of work
with the Biden administration and Secretary of Cardona or how
we miss them so much, So it wasn't unbeknownst to
me that there could have been someone on our free
class hearing us talk about that, because we do have
(30:43):
people that, especially those that are listening to your podcasts
that are therapists. You know, sometimes it's hard for therapists
to get qualified for PSL left because they're doing private work.
But what if you're listening and you have your own
nonprofit and you do do great work in the community,
could one from your boards sign off to be able
to attest to you working in this nonprofit. Just thought.
(31:06):
If we're thinking about going back to school, I think
what I see is that a lot of my older
students that are going back for a master's or a
doctoral degree feel a little like embarrassed, if you will,
or a little ashamed for going towards scholarships because they
feel like that's not something for older people, and it's
like who gave you that? I like to take that
(31:27):
away from them today, so that a way this year
and go apply for some money. So we have something
in our community called don't be weird. And I say
this to my students. People say the all the time,
Doctor Lewis. When I worked at the hospital in twenty fifteen,
I left there, But I don't know if they liked
me when I worked there, Like did you work did
(31:48):
you work there for thirty hours? Or your student loans
and good standing? Did you work there? Yes? Like, go
get your paperwork signed, and let's get this credit towards forgiveness.
So I do want to say that, because I didn't
say that early. Anyone listening that worked in a qualifying
field nonprofit or not for profit two thousand and seven.
In twenty and twenty two, you can go back to
(32:08):
your employer you work there at least thirty hours a
week and have them sign off a testing that you
work there. It doesn't matter even if you never made
a student loan payment, as long as you work there,
your student loans were good standing, you worked there for
thirty hours a week, you can still get credit towards forgiveness.
And that that program public service on forgiveness because people
will forget that they work places, or they think because
(32:28):
they left and they don't remember leaving on the best terms,
or did you work there? Where are you're a good
standing thirty hours a week? Go get your credit? You
know what I mean? People we get forgiven a week
with that program, about like sixty people a week get
forgiven just for that one. They got to go do
the work right, they got to go get a sign.
Then one lady, oh my god, God bless her, almost
blocked her. She kept messaging me and she just kept saying,
(32:52):
I just feel uncomfortable reaching out to them. It's been
so long ago. I told her, I said, this is
my last time responding. I said, you need to go
do the work all right, fast work I'm speaking at
I think invest fast or something I don't know. And
she like flew in just to give me a hug,
and she said, thank you for not blocking me. She said,
I wanted to tell you because you motivated me to
(33:13):
go and to get my paperwork signed. She got two
hundred and fifty thousand forgiven. So we were say in
our community, don't be weird, go get your paywork cred.
So anyone listening, I'm telling you right now that has
some work history that they have not claimed towards forgiveness
and that window is still open to get that paperwork sign.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
So where did you start this process? Like is this
something that still exists on the studioa dotm website? So
what should people look for to like maybe check on
this studenta.
Speaker 2 (33:40):
Dot up and then type in TEPSL left so Temporary
Expanded Public Service Loan Forgiveness. The form will come up
and then you just go to your You want to
fill out the first one or two pages, but there's
an employer section. All we need is their name, their email,
their phone number, their signature they're testing. The middle hours
(34:00):
a week is thirty hours a week for that time
period two thousand and seven to twenty twenty two. Okay,
here's the next question. Well, what if they closed? What
if my manager no longer works there? Errol, don't you
know it's something called Facebook LinkedIn Instagram. Most times we're
in connection with our old employers and some capacity. But
go find the people that used to work in management
(34:22):
HR at those jobs.
Speaker 1 (34:25):
So it doesn't need to be like your direct boss.
It could be somebody who was in HR over the
entire company that didn't even have any And even if
you never knew them, they should still have your records, right,
so they can still pull it up and say, yes,
I can see this person worked there from this date.
Speaker 2 (34:39):
To this day. Doctor Joey. There's a lot of women
that listen to this podcast. Ladies. If somebody was coming
after your men, he was fuying her. But pull up
somebody listening. Let's say they owe three hundred thousand study loans.
Act like the person to this signature owes you three
hundred thousand dollars, because they do. We need to get
(35:00):
rid of these student loans. Go find someone to sign this.
You want it to be if possible with signature, or
you can like email the form. They could scan it back.
In my experience, like, but not to be funny, you
might need to pull up on the job, like, go
get a signature. Yeah, three hundred thousand is on the
line here, You've got time. So that's why I tell
people when we start framing it that way, you'd be
(35:23):
surprised we saw all these signatures coming through our community.
Speaker 1 (35:27):
I love that.
Speaker 2 (35:28):
I love that I'm here to be respected. So why
I'm pleasant, I'm very straightforward in this community because these
are adults that we do not have time to coddle
in the world. Their student loan forgiveness is dependent upon
home buying. It's depending upon the people that are counting
on them. So why we do not have the time
to baby people in this community. So yes, we're giving
it to straight today.
Speaker 1 (35:49):
Yes, So I love the example that you're giving me
because I do think like you mentioned, right, like, there
are so many stories that we create in our heads
that are not based in any truth, but are often
based in fear or like anxiety or insecurity. Are there
other things that you find yourself kind of having to
challenge people around in the best interests of you know,
kind of going after their money or getting the support
(36:09):
they need.
Speaker 2 (36:09):
This is True Therapy podcast And by the way, I
really do love your brodcast. Listen, this is up here
near over with me, honey. So there's this conversation with
money that I was having with myself that I didn't
know I was having. Now I'm working some stuff out
because I was telling my therapists, but from going from
overdrafting like I used to overdraft my account, like I
planned for that all right, so my account is overdraft
(36:32):
to now I don't overdraft. Now I'm in surplus. I
do very well with money, right, but there's still some
broke behaviors that are showing up in my life, right,
Like why is this still showing up? And it's because
even though I have some money, and even though I
pay my bills on all the pay you know, there's still
a thing that I haven't let go, which is a
scarcity mindset. And so what I'm seeing here with those
(36:54):
that are figuring out their student loans. Some people, yes,
cannot afford to pay their stud loans, Yes I agree,
but there are some people who can. And that there's
this old stigma that you don't have to pay them back.
You're not going to pay them back. You may not
be using the degree, why should you pay it back?
And the only person that's hurting is themselves. You're hurting
you right now. If you're listening, you're hurting you. You're
(37:16):
not keeping up with your counterparts who are in the
world that are buying homes, investment properties, crypto whatever, we're
doing right with our moneyes and we have to doctor Joey.
We've got to start having some real conversations to say,
let's figure out what we can afford. Let's figure out
what we can do with our student loans so we're
(37:36):
not left behind in this ecosystem. Because the student loans
shows up with the credit, it shows up with the
home buying, it shows up when it's time to invest,
it shows up if your child needs you later on.
So we've got to overcome these conversations about money with ourselves,
and I think that for anyone that truly believes in therapy,
(37:56):
I would like for them to ask themselves what are
their thoughts about money this year and let that be
a conversation to work through with their therapists, because it's
starting to play a role into what people are are
not doing with these loans. So what's coming up for
me with our clients is we're not therapist. Let me
be clear, Okay, So we always take it back to
(38:17):
what is showing on student a dot gov and what
happens is before we can even talk about what a
payment could look like and figure out, you got to
hear the client for ten minutes talk about the shame
around what they borrowed or the feelings about what they
borrowed or and we let people talk. But the theme
is people it's like they feel bad. We want to
(38:38):
move them from feeling bad to empowerment to going to
doing something about this. So that's what's coming up a
lot for us right now. There's a lot of shame
around what people owe.
Speaker 1 (38:46):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, and I think just historically we
know this, right like, there's a lot of shame just
around money, I think in general in our community, right,
like and and it does them from the scarcity and
like us just not having it historically, right, And so
now even if you do have some, they're all these
old messages, old stories that really need to be reconstructed.
Something you said made me think of For a long time,
(39:08):
people thought about student loans as good debt, right, like,
this is not something that you have to worry about, like, oh,
you can pay the least amount. And so I'm glad
that you keep bringing us back to like no, no, no, y'all,
Like this shows up on your credit report, Like there's
not a separate credit report that exists only for like
student loan stuff. It's all lumped in together with like
credit card and anything else that you have accumulated.
Speaker 2 (39:30):
They're using defaulted loans as a metric they as in
government officials to not give people government clearances or jobs. Okay,
you could have and this is what's really crazy. You
could have went to school, you could have did, and
if you ever default on a student loan, you could
block yourself from a clearance with the government, even as
(39:51):
a contractor. And so that's keeping a lot of our
black and brown people from advancing because they didn't know.
Like I'm sharing it on this podcast. This happened like
in the last year at least like fifty of our
clients reported that they lost a job because of it, Like,
so they got hired. I'll use an example, Lackey Martin,
contractor of the government hires you, loves you, excited about you.
(40:13):
You can't pass the security clearance because of the default
is still a long yeah, yeah, what do you want
to do the like Also you can't like get it
out of default and like being reapplied, but you defaulted
at least once in your life. I feel like being
more talked about because people are going back into repayment
and are finding out a surge of it because now
people can actually be in default and that wasn't the
(40:36):
case in like the last five years.
Speaker 1 (40:37):
Mm hmm, got it. There's so many more questions, but
I do want to I don't want to take up
your whole day, but I do want to make sure
we address you know, instead of going into default, Like
if you realize, okay, I just got laid off, this
is going to be difficult for me. What should people
do instead of defaulting on loans? Like what kinds of
options do you have.
Speaker 2 (40:56):
First of let's just take a depreath, because life happens
right and you are not the lay off. It's about
tell people like stop to joy the layoff, be the layup. Okay, pocus.
Speaker 1 (41:07):
Great.
Speaker 2 (41:08):
But what I want people to know is that if
they can remember, because life is lifeing, they would go
into student hay dot GUV under the loan repayment tab,
click the income driven application and they're just going to
do an update or a new application. And there's a
question that says do you have taxable income? The answer
would be no. So you go through the applications like
on page three or four, do you have taxtble income? No.
(41:30):
You have to then check where it says do you
want your loan provider to do a manual review of
your income? You have to hit yes. Okay, so income
change or taxable income no, manual review? Yes? Has there
been any changes with your income? Yes? And then says
do you want your loan provider to do a manual review? Yes?
(41:52):
Do you have taxable income no? That's it so very
important how you answer those questions because those questions will
then trigger you to have a zero dollar payment for
the year. So that way you don't go into default.
They require no payment of you because we're saying that
there's a life change, there's no taxtbal income, We're fine.
So that's important for people to hear because if not,
(42:14):
most people won't do anything. They're in a headspace and
then they go into default and the application could have
taken care of that.
Speaker 1 (42:21):
Okay, I appreciate you sharing that and walking us through
those tips.
Speaker 2 (42:23):
Yeah, God's go like this. Let me say this, hopefully
people stay in touch with me after this episode because
every Monday apm eest we do a free class where
we literally log in the student aight dot gov together
and we see what's going on together. After I'm not
making this up. Every two weeks, they're changing that website
and application, so they're like re ordering the questions, very sneaky.
(42:45):
I don't like it because you might have heard me
say this before, but now you got to go click
another place. And so we just want people to stay
connected with us. And literally we have people that show
up for the last year every Monday because stuff is
changing all of the time. Where would you find out
about these updates? It didn't get published anywhere, it didn't
get published on the website and didn't get published on
(43:06):
the news website. So it's like unless you're in there
clicking around, you wouldn't know.
Speaker 1 (43:11):
So necard Lewis, you've mentioned this a couple of times.
I definitely want to make sure we know where to
point people, So where can people stay connected with you
to find out about the classes and all the things that.
Speaker 2 (43:19):
You offer, So we act like a news reporter. Our
Instagram page, the student Loan Doctor is where it's my
favorite social media platform for where I put up like
ninety second to three minute clips of what's happening in
the world right. And then outside of that Monday nights,
they can register through the Instagram page or the website
is doctor Please help Me dot com. It's a free class.
(43:40):
You don't have to pay to be there. It's about
a two hour class and we literally teach you from
the rooty to the two D re payment plans forgiveness programs.
Let's log in together. You'd be surprised people put in
the chat. I haven't logged in four years, so they're
filling in power right. And then from there, if we
can help them, we will. But most times people just
need to be in an environment that's safe, that we're
(44:01):
all tracking the same way. Sometimes I do a poll
like I might do one tonight that says how much
do you all ow? I do that sometimes because I
need people to see you ain't the only one that
got five hundred thousand, you know, like last month we
got a guy forgiving nine hundred and ninety seven thousand
dollars right, that's right at a million, and we didn't
make him fel bad about it. So we want anyone
(44:23):
from the little bit to the lot in class so
that they can just learn without pressure and then you
go in the world and figure out what you need
to do. So I really love the community we're creating.
Nobody's showing up weird, nobody's being no bully. We actually
set the tone for class. I love doing that. If
you show up me where you will be dropped from
the zoom never to return. We don't have those issues,
(44:44):
and it's a safe face and people you could see
with their notebooks taking their notes and really participating and
playing along. And then I just feel really proud that
we're a part of educating the community at large about
their student loans and before our class, I just love
to say there was not a lot of people that
were talking about this topic. Honey, don't mix this in
(45:05):
with credit either. We're not that, Like, we just want
to talk about student loans, right. And then I love
that we are Finally, we've been in business now for
ten years, doctor Joy. We're doing press like CNN, we
just the ABC World News. We're doing some really big
stuff in the world. And I'm like, we aren't that
because we show up every day all day. I had
to put my appoint at that for the world to
(45:27):
do my little update because see you, I remember and
you know about this, like when something big comes out,
people's brain can't always process it and they're looking for
someone they trust to give them the facts right in
a safe space and then they can go on with
their day. So that's what we do. So when you
came to see my little AI advertire, mind your business
because that work to day that by makeup wasn't done
(45:50):
or something. And I got a little AI that looked
like me. I say, it's Ai. I'm be trying to
trick nobody say powered by Ai Yasha because when news
comes out, who am I to go get you or
buy lashes done or something. Christen just take information going
about to day.
Speaker 1 (46:04):
I love it when it's definitely needed right now. So
thank you so much for that service because it sounds
like it's helping a lot of people, and we will
be sure to include that information in the show, not
so that people can get connected with you and your coaches,
so that they can learn even more about how to
take care of themselves and their financial health.
Speaker 2 (46:19):
And thank you so much for your platform. I'm telling you, girl,
you done gotten me through some stuff, but you have help,
and so I think your platform is just so important
because it's a lot like this is not yesterday's yesterday, yes,
and you're trying to process personal relationships, professional relationships, the
different roles you wear, Oh you got your finances on fire,
like who are we? And sometimes it's just good to
(46:42):
just take a moment, take a beat, to be like
is it really that serious? And then I feel like
your voice is so befitting, Like I don't know, God
gave me the voice because I'm like, if doctor Joyce's son,
go get some shy tea and work out the problems.
So just continue, doctor Joyce. I don't know how much
longer you want to do this work, but we love
itppreciate the work that you're doing.
Speaker 1 (47:01):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (47:01):
I was so thrilled with the invitation. It really was.
I mean, this is like my Oprah moment. I mean
the Oprah you could call me though. Nice. No, no,
don't forget it.
Speaker 1 (47:09):
Confused, Okay, we will still accept the invitation.
Speaker 2 (47:11):
But I love, love, love the work that you're doing.
You've helped me out many times. You got a lot
of people say for being cussed out, the Lord is
doing a work in you. Because I said, what did
she say before? I call this? Persons back?
Speaker 1 (47:22):
There you go, there you go. I appreciate that. Thank you,
and thank you for spending some time with us today.
I appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (47:28):
Yes, thanks so much.
Speaker 1 (47:29):
Of course, I'm so happy doctor Lewis was able to
join us for today's episode. To learn more about her,
or to register for her free Monday night student loan classes,
or stay up to date on policy changes, be sure
to visit the show notes at Therapy for Black Girls
dot com slash Session four fifty one, and don't forget
(47:50):
to text this episode to two of your girls right
now and tell them to check it out. Did you
know that you could leave us a voicemail with your
questions or suggestions for the podcast. If you have toime
topics you think we should discuss, drop us a message
at Memo dot fm slash Therapy for Black Girls and
let us know what's on your mind. We just might
feature it on the podcast. If you're looking for a
therapist in your area, visit our therapist directory at Therapy
(48:13):
for Blackgirls dot com slash directory. Don't forget to follow
us over on Instagram at Therapy for Black Girls and
join us in our Patreon channel for exclusive updates, behind
the scenes content, and much more. You can join us
at community dot Therapy for Blackgirls dot com. This episode
was produced by Elise Ellis, Indechubu and Tyree Rush. Editing
(48:34):
was done by Dennis and Bradford. Thank y'all so much
for joining me again this week. I look forward to
continuing this conversation with you all real soon. Take good care.
Welcome to the Therapy for Black Girls Podcast, a weekly
conversation about mental health, personal development, and all the small
decisions we can make to become the best possible versions
of ourselves. I'm your host, doctor joy hard and Bradford,
a licensed psychologist in Atlanta, Georgia. For more information or
(00:32):
to find a therapist in your area, visit our website
at Therapy for Blackgirls dot com. While I hope you
love listening to and learning from the podcast, it is
not meant to be a substitute for a relationship with
a licensed mental health professional. Hey, y'all, thanks so much
(00:57):
for joining me for session four fifty one of the
Things for Black Girls Podcast. We'll get right into our
conversation after word from our sponsors. Student loans have always
been a source of stress from many of us, but
(01:18):
with recent policy changes shifting repayment requirements and propose funding
cuts to certain graduate programs, that stress has reached a
new level. From confusion about repayment restarting, to fears about
forgiveness programs disappearing, to conversations about reclassifying degrees like nursing, psychology,
and social work. There's a lot of information circulating and
(01:41):
not all of it is accurate to help us or
through what's really happening and what we can do about it.
I'm joined by doctor Sonya Lewis, also known as a
Student Loan Doctor. Doctor Lewis is a financial expert who
has helped tens of thousands of borrowers navigate repayment, forgiveness,
and financial strategy. What began as her answering questions after
(02:02):
church has grown into a seven figure consulting business with
coaches around the world. If something resonates with you while
enjoying our conversation, please share with us on social media
using the hashtag TVG in session, or join us over
in our Patreon to talk more about the episode. You
can join us at community dot therapy for Blackgirls dot com.
Here's our conversation. Well, thank you so much for joining
(02:29):
us today, doctor Lewis.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
I would love for you to tell us more about
how you got into the work that you're doing supporting
families with financial aids.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
So this work begun two thousand and fifteen in Philadelphia, PA.
That's where I'm from. I was really on a journey
trying to figure out my own financial situation as it
relates to just becoming an adele understanding student loans. And
also that's my professional background. And I took a financial
literacy course at church and what I realized and this
(03:00):
course was there was no one to really talk about
student loans or what to do with them. And so
because that's what I have already been doing professionally, at
that point, I said, well, I can help people and
teach them after class at the church, having lines of
people coming in for a consultation that I never said
I would give. But we're in the house of the Lord,
(03:21):
so how because you not? And then I said, oh okay,
I said, well, if people are willing to come, I said,
they could pay me for my time. We could meet
at corner bakery. I feel like every great business starts
at a bakery somewhere with the plug and Wi Fi.
And then sometimes you have to flirt to get the
table with the plug. But it's all right. So that's
how it went for like the first six months. I
(03:41):
didn't know any better. I was just trying to charge
an hour when I got paid at work, because there's
no concept of where you're supposed to be paid as
a business owner and then I was like, I think
I need to go up with my prices. I need
a row office. Long story short, I was able to
growing into well technically it's a seven figure business now
consulting business, and I have coach all over the world,
but it really just started with me answering and helping
(04:04):
people at the church. So here we are today, yea.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
And I would imagine that you have seen so much
in terms of how the landscape has changed from year
to years. Are there some major themes that you feel
like have come up in your work with your students
or with your clients, and you've been maybe your coaches
and their clients that you think are important to kind
of highlight. I think that every administration has a different
tone of how they handle student loan repayment, and so
(04:28):
we brace ourselves because I've now been through a few
administrations with this and unfortunately right now the timing of
this podcast where it is miss stuff just making sure
that people understand that this administration they won't require you
to pay, They're going to not make things so easy.
We're coming off of a five year repayment pause because
of the pandemic, so there's a lot of anxiety there's
(04:50):
a lot of unknown There's a lot of unclear and
not true information circulating around too that we try to
clear up for people. But we know that student loans
lives in the middle really of everything, financial health, emotional health,
just even.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
How people interact with their personal relationships. If I get married,
do I have to tell my partner about my student loans? Yes,
it shows up later it's time to go buy a
home together. So depending on what they come to the
table with will depend on the problem that we're tackling.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
Yeah, so it sounds like a lot of the questions
recently have been around like repayment, right, Like, whereas you know,
in the past couple of years, we've had a little
bit more laxed, a little bit more leeway, And you're saying,
now with this administration, folks really should be focusing on, Okay,
how do I actually start to repay these loans?
Speaker 2 (05:40):
Yeah, because if you don't, they will. So what I'm
telling everyone is that the process of repayment has started, right.
A lot of people didn't know that, which is okay.
Over half of them have started repayment, but over half
of them didn't know. You only find out when your
credit score drops or when you go to make a
big purchase and then it shows up. So people are
(06:01):
really surprised that. And I think that there was like
this thing that people were going to be notified that
that repayment was happening. They're not notifying anyone.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
And so you mentioned that you feel like there's also
a lot of misinformation out there, maybe about the repayment
process or maybe about the process of getting loans in general.
Can you clear up maybe some of those nets or
bad information that you've heard out there. So a change
that was recently announced with this administration was that they're
going to be reclassifying or declassifying certain programs that really
(06:33):
put people on the uproar because it feels like a
personal attack, like, what do you mean my nursing degree
is not professional? Right, we'll use that field for example.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
Technically, what the administration was saying is that certain fields,
because of the return on investment from a student loan perspective,
did not pay out as well as others over the years.
I think this administration did not lead properly with we
are declassified or we classify in certain fields because there's
(07:02):
a high default rate. If the administration would have led
with numbers. I think people could understand numbers better than
just you're not a professional. I think that there was
an opportunity to educate people instead of like penalizing them.
But here we are. So that's one big change. You
have to know for those listening that are going to
go back to grad school or just in general go
(07:23):
to college, or they have family members, or if someone's
listening to their child's about to go to school, if
your child wants to be let's say, a teacher or
a nurse, the question is there enough funding to take
them all the way through? Therapists are including this too.
There's a lot of people business owners like for nbas
is there enough funding to take you all the way
(07:44):
through to complete your degrees at a master's or a
doctoral level? So should you choose right? That's first big
change because if not, that requires people to say we're
gonna need scholarships, were gonna need grants, We're going to
need to help our child pay for school. The second
big thing is they're eliminating some repayment plans, So now
we have to make sure that people are educated on Okay,
(08:06):
this is what repayment looks like. This is what you're
going to be required to pay all your credit score
is going to drop. We want people also to be
aware that forgiveness programs still exists, they're still around. The
problem with that, though, is that the funding for forgiveness programs.
I want to use an example like Barber's defense. If
you went to a school that was a for profit
(08:29):
school like University of Phoenix or DeVry, you're eligible to
get some of those loans or all of those loans forgiven.
The challenge with that is that after July they can
take some of that funding away. So in our space,
we're trying to educate the new person coming in, we're
educating the person that's in, and then we're educating the
person that doesn't yet know about forgiveness programs they're eligible for.
(08:51):
So every day we're kind of like in three headspaces
with our clients. Just depending what the person has going on,
we kind of see what part of the conversation they
need to deal with first. Does that answer your question?
Because there's so many things.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
Be does and I have a lot of follow up
questions that I'm sure will also help to kind of clarify.
So one you just mentioned that like people are in
three different phases, right, Like they are coming into the system,
they're currently in, or they're like kind of out and
still figuring out. Like what the repayment options are, So
student loans, I'm wondering they do not work on like
you follow the guidelines that were set when you answered
(09:23):
the program. Right, So if I like got loans ten
years ago, and like the rules were that, you know,
I had ten years to pay it back or whatever,
does that change with every administration? Or am I locked
up or whatever I signed at the time I signed it.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
I'm going to answer this question professionally. People signed a
promisary note, you can't do that. They're like, okay, take
it back. So to answer your question, in general, that
is not legal to do. So I always say, we
don't know what this administration, what day, and what hour
you'll get. So to answer your question, if you signed
up for student loans ten years ago, there's a promisary
(09:56):
note in which you will abide by those terms are
still so relevant today.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
God very okay, perfect, Like you said, in general, right,
because we don't know what could be happening tomorrow. So
the next question, and I definitely want to spend more
time talking about this. I am trained as a psychologist,
so there has been lots of conversations in the mental
health states around this, like declassifying and changes in classification
to things like psychology, nursing, social work. This is the
(10:23):
first time I'm actually hearing it put the way that
you put it, and so I do agree that you
know that is the messaging that maybe could have let it.
But I think for a lot of people this has
felt very targeted, right because we also know that this
is a space where we find lots of black women,
right like in the helping professions. I'm curious if these
seals are the ones that you're saying are not having
like a high return on investment, what feels actually had
(10:47):
a higher return on investment in terms of the ones
that maybe are still classified as professional.
Speaker 2 (10:52):
So when we talk about the reclassification, we know that
historically students entering these fields that we're targeted are coming
from a people of color, working class families, first generation backgrounds, right,
you name it, and so there's already financial barriers there.
And so what we're seeing is that when we looked
at the data, like let's just talk about data, the
(11:13):
data show that students that completed degrees, particularly not so
much at the bachelors of I do want to stress
that though, and the masters in the doctoral level had
a higher default and less repayment rate. Now, there could
be a lot of things that we could really dive into, right,
and now we're talking about adults too. We're having trouble
with prioritizing repayment. And so this administration said, and I
(11:38):
don't agree with this, by the way, I'm just saying
data data shows that there were high default rates in
these areas, but it also could be that there just
could be a lack of understanding money, understanding how student
loans work, understanding repayment options. And I want to say this,
a lot of these programs are really expensive. So doctor Joy,
(11:59):
what I always like the answer here is that don't
make just the student or the barrower accountable. Make the colleges,
the universities accountable. Why are these programs six figure programs?
So then when someone comes out they're going into the
field of psychology, for example, everyone's not starting off with
six figure salaries.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
Most people are not.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
But they borrowed it, right, Yeah, So the problem is
is that it's not a good investment in terms of
money wise, that we would say, okay, borrow two hundred thousand,
but you're only going to get paid fifty. But when
we talk about fills that are on track with repaying
their loans, let me say this too. This administration has
taken away a lot of data driven websites. So my
(12:43):
background is that I was studying how African American women
were impacted by Loan Day. So there were websites that
I would use to pull on for data like this
because that's what I will study it and my doctoral degree. Girl,
they're going now. So what I will tell you to
be true is when we think about someone that is
going to be agnor well, they probably won't take that
financial funding away from them because the school won't comply
(13:05):
with changing their prices. See what I'm trying to say
is that this is a big problem with our entire ecosystem.
The education system is so messed up that why are
we allowing schools to charge this amount of money? Then
people have to borrow this amount of money. This administration
does not believe in federal funding period. This administration believes
that funding should come from states or private So when
(13:28):
we saw them pull what I call a chess move
and say, hey, we're going to take some funding away
from these degrees. What they want people to do doctory
let's not forget who makes money from this when they
leave office. They want you to go to a local bank.
Let's say go to a local P and C. And
they want people to apply for a private loan at
(13:49):
P and C. Now we know that credit is not
treated fairly amongst black and brown women specifically, so then
there could be what denials. I see your question directly
by saying that there isn't necessarily a published site that
shows the programming of who are paying back their loans, right,
It's just that they honed in on these particular fields
(14:10):
which historically affect people of color, particularly women.
Speaker 1 (14:15):
More from our conversation after the break, and I think
it is a conversation around the larger ecosystem of care
because you mentioned like, oh, they're probably not going to
take away funding from people who are going to medical school,
(14:36):
for like the neurosurgeons. But the neurosurgeon can't do his
work if the nurse is not available to also of this.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
It's right here.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
Well, so it does feel like this weird ranking which
I think is always a conversation in the medical space, right,
see six people in an hour. A social worker is
only seeing one person in an hour, right, and so
the rates are already not the same, and so it
is a larger conversation I think around just the hierarchy
that exists both in the mental and medical se but
also then what does that mean in terms of care
(15:03):
for our community? Because we know when there are more
black therapists, like social workers, black nurses, then we are
also typically working or at least a higher rate of
us are working in spaces where our community is also serviced, right,
And so that means I think a lack of care
or the level of care and consideration that we would
be expecting for our community to be able to get.
Speaker 2 (15:23):
So, doctor Joe, I could trigger with this conversation a
couple of ways, right, because as a black woman, when
the information first came out, I was all in my feelings,
let's just I'm human. I was like, oh wait a minute.
Then I'd put my scholar head on. Okay, they had
put a scholar head on. And then I started doing
some data research just to kind of see what they
were saying. And something I think that was important to
come out was that it wasn't just about any particular profession,
(15:44):
although we know who it impacts the most. It was
really re evaluating the program and the borrowing limits because
of the data. Just the money part of alone, right,
And when I look at what I do, I've helped
over fifty thousand people collectively with my team, and if
I could be honest with you, yeah, these fields have
a higher borrower and default rate. I have data that
(16:06):
shows it just in my back end. Now let's just
put that on the table and say that this doesn't
make people bad people, and I mean paid enough to
pay back what they borrow. But we still need these
people in these fields and professions. But then doctor Jorie
put another hand on and this is just me personally
moving into a more philanthropic stage in my life. I
think about what we really need our community to start
(16:27):
being community, Like we really need to start looking at
where are our dollars going and how can we support
students in these fields, Like where could my dollar be
better served at in terms of scholarship money. Now, I
also want to demystified in this season that everyone listening
could do a scholarship back to one person at their church,
(16:49):
their high school, their college, to help our next nurse,
to help our next therapist, our next psychologists. And it
really is going to have to start to look like
that because I just think that the funding window federally
is going unless we get some change of administration, it's
going to get smaller, more restrictive, more biased. And then
(17:10):
I think that we're going to have to really call
on bigger entities like with the NAACP does right, our
churches are going to have to be more targeted with
the students in our community, our community members such as
you and I. Could we have a scholarship for the
therapy for black girls. And I think that's where I'm
leaning into because sometimes there are problems that are just
(17:33):
bigger than us. The first question I just asked myself
when all this came out is well, what can you do?
Speaker 1 (17:37):
So?
Speaker 2 (17:38):
I know what I can do as a professional. I
can on my platform, I still long doctor platform. I
can educate, I do free classes every Monday. Anyway, I
maybe I do some more right, Maybe I could and
actually not. Maybe what caused me to do this was
when this news came out, I reached out to a
lot of specific platforms like those that do, for example,
with nursing, and I said, hey, I want to go
(17:58):
to a hospital and see a black nurse. That's what
I want to see. I want to work with black therapists.
I want my dinnis black. Like I'm really very selective.
That's what I want. But if I want that, then
I got to support that too. And so now, see,
doctor Jerry, I got to open up the ecosystem. Now
we got to open up the community. We really in
(18:18):
this country, we have an education problem, down to investing
in ourselves, down to let's not support these institutions that
are costing this much money. Why don't we support our
community in state colleges more. We got to destigmatize that
you went to a community or state college. You should
go there, right because it's the same teacher teaching. Hear
it and I lead school at the same day. And
(18:41):
then as a community, what can we start doing within
our own communities. I know this year, doctor Joy, I
gave a lot of money to my high school, and
I'm committed to giving more to my high school and
to my college. That's where my giving between that times
in the community. That's what I'm doing because that's the
only thing I could think that would make me feel
(19:01):
better about investing in the future of the landscape of
these professions. Okay, I'm answering your question in several ways
because I'm a woman, a black woman, you a practitioner dollar.
This is a huge, huge problem, and I don't want
this conversation to be it. So I appreciate you asking
these questions because I don't want this conversation to be
(19:24):
swept under the rug because it's not a headline anymore
because someone's listening their kids or their cousins.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
Or their We're in that window right now, like people
are getting their acceptances and yeah, so this is the
time to really start thinking about it. So when does
this like new law go into effect, doctor Lewis, So
at what point is this.
Speaker 2 (19:42):
It's still got if right?
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Okay, so it's still it's not official yet. This is
just something on the table.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
Let me say something about this administration, Honey. They can
put out something like it's done. I need the laws,
like I mean, but it doesn't matter because he's not
really following the laws and rules as it's written. Pull
out your chat GPT. It matters because when we have
mid term elections and we have bigger elections at large
because we know that these things aren't law yet we
(20:08):
can still have things in place to change them. It
does matter. And I'm glad you said that because you
could feel listening or seeing headlines like it's right here
and then you can check out. I'm telling you almost
to me, So I'm telling everyone listening to check back in.
You can still enforce change. So they're proposing for these
changes to occur as of July first, like there are
(20:28):
opportunities with really just at our local, our state government
that impacts what happens even on federal levels. So yes,
to your point. When this administration shares things, I'm saying
this for everyone listening, it could feel like that's it.
That's how they drop announcements these days. I ain't see
nothing about it. Now you will think that there's no
(20:49):
judicial process. What I do appreciate is that there are
still judges and there are still courts that are cutting
this stuff down the side. They put out an announcement
and then you got to stay with the news, right,
you got to see that the courts over said, no,
overrided it. No Congress stepped in. So I'd be like, Lord,
thank you for letting somebody be there normal.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
So that feels like it could be like an intervention
point is to actually, like when you talk about writing
letters to Congress or getting on the phone and calling
your congress son, this is an opportunity because this is
not something that has been signed into lawduss, Well, I do.
Speaker 2 (21:21):
I can even share with your team what I share
out on my Monday classes of how they can get
into contact with people who would make a change in
this space. So yes, I'll get that information over to
you guys, because we can still do something and you
have to be annoyingt and you have to call, and
you have to be documenting, but you still have to
be professional, like we don't want a bunch of people
calling up there customing you know, things of that nature. Literally,
(21:44):
I gave my students a script what to say, what
to do, hang up? Yeah, okay. Change.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
So it sounds like, you know, this is changing the
ways that you're having conversations with your students about maybe
would they even want to pursue? Right, So, if I'm
somebody who has dreamed of being a psychologist and now
maybe I find with this, you know, maybe proposed change,
I have to think about funding differently, right, because I
know for a lot of people psychologists specifically, like there
was a forgiveness program and you may know more about
(22:13):
this ten years than your loans were forgiven. And that's
something that's also on the shopping block as a potential
that's going to go away.
Speaker 2 (22:22):
There's a program called Public Service Loan Forgiveness, yes, and
it doesn't necessarily have to be rural. It just has
to be a nonprofit or not for profit. That program
did not get clipped or cut. That is still through Congress.
So I need everyone listening to know that there are
two types of programs, a Congress program and a Department
of Education program. Department of Education programs can be changed,
(22:42):
clip cut, modified per administration. Public Service Loan Forgiveness is
a Congress program. So we're good.
Speaker 1 (22:49):
More from our conversation after the break. But I do
think Stilvi, it's back to my original point of you know,
I think this could lend itself to people thinking differently
about like what kinds of things they want to pursue
(23:10):
in terms of career. Because you mentioned you haven't seen
it so much kind of getting cut at the bachelor's level,
but a lot of these programs that you're talking about.
There's very little that you can do with a bachelor's
in psychology, right, like you have to get a master
that leads to be able to practice and stuff. And
so what kinds of conversations are how are you helping
your students think through.
Speaker 2 (23:29):
A lot of our clients are already done with school.
So I bring these conversations to our platform because we
were working with a lot of parents and a lot
of people who are investing in their loved ones that
are going to school. To answer your question, what I
would advise anyone listening that's think about going to school
for their masters or their doctoral degree, Let's just make
sure we have enough funding to be able to cover it,
(23:50):
because they cut out what's called grad plus funding, which
is very significant to pay for your master's or doctoral
level degrees. Also, the thing is someone could still go
for a master's or a doctoral degree, but it's probably
going to require them to work and go to school.
(24:10):
So before you could just do one or the other
because there was enough funding to support your lifestyle while
you were in school. But now it's not the case.
And I want to also say this, can we find
someone else to pay for school. Can we find an
employer to help us pay because there are employers that
will help you pay for write offs too, And that's
one thing I think this is underutilized. I've often seen
(24:31):
people get a master it's not really doctoral degree, but
a master's and then not even work in the field,
Like why do we take this degree on? So we
need to make sure that people have a clear understanding
before borrowing at this level what it is that they
want to do in the world. Too. This is not
the season to enroll and then figure it out. This
(24:52):
is the season to have things pretty already figured out
and then wrong? Am I saying that right, doctor Jory?
Because you know if this happened to you, but it
happened to me in my undergrad In my undergrad I
was a psychology major, Yes I was. I got to
my junior year, I tell you, and I could not
pass the class called methods. I had to the staff
(25:13):
cuss yet methods. And then there was another class I
couldn't pass. It was too I had to keep a
rat alive. What was that class called?
Speaker 1 (25:21):
Oh, experimential psychology? Uh huh.
Speaker 2 (25:23):
I couldn't pay it, can't pass it. And I was
on a scholarship too, and they were about to take
my scholarship because I couldn't pass a class, and I said,
may not be for me, So then I had to pivot.
My bachelor's is in anthropology, but the core of it,
what I really really wanted to be, doctor Joy was
a teacher. But there was a negative connotation that teachers
don't make money. All the people in my family are teachers.
(25:46):
But I think that I wish that there was an
opportunity to have some more coaching career coaching for myself
at that point around what did I want to be
or do before going into college. So I'm using the
story to say anyone listening to has children, family members,
we have to sit our young people down and ask
them what do you want to be? What would make
you happy before just allowing our students to just blindly
(26:10):
study and figure it out. It's a hard thing is
the times are changing. There's not an infinite amount of
money anymore to be able to just kind of figure
stuff out.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
Yeah, yeah, it does feel like because I think historically,
you know, college is a time where you explore, right, like,
I don't know what I want to do. That's why
you take a bunch of stuff, right, and you're saying
the landscape has changed so much that it's expensive to
try to explore like at that point, right, Like the
exploration almost has to happen ahead of time before you
spend a bunch of money pursuing something that's not going
to be a good bail for you.
Speaker 2 (26:40):
Yeah, internships can help with that. Pre college experience can
help with that. I would rather someone go to a
community college before a traditional college to alleviate costs with that.
There has to be a way to explore without putting
out all of that cost because that money is so
short now that that pool of money is no longer
(27:02):
available like it once was.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
You mentioned doctor lewis an option, and I would love
to hear other things maybe that you share with your
students in terms of looking at like employers who will
sometimes help you to pay for the cost of schooling.
Are there other creative things that people should be exploring
that maybe they're not aware of in terms of finding
other entities to pay for a school.
Speaker 2 (27:22):
Well, I think that let's just go back to employment.
You ever look at your employment policy and they say
that they'll help you with tuition reimbursement. You know, you
can propose to your lawyer, and I don't have it
in front of me, so just use chat, GPT or
you know, just find this out. But you could take
that same policy and ask them for student loan reimbursement.
(27:44):
Employers are able to reimburse student loans the same way
they give up front for tuition, but people don't think
to ask that because it's not a common practice. But
I dare someone listening to have a meeting with your
manager and say, I see that there is a tuition
re imbursement policy, but what's missing is a student loan
(28:06):
re imbursement policy. Is there any way that could be
consider if I was able to show proof that I'm
paying on my student.
Speaker 1 (28:11):
Loans, doesn't hurt this questions there.
Speaker 2 (28:14):
This is actually something that's in the text code that
allows employers to do this. And when I found this out,
I was like, oh wow. I was like, I wonder
why more employers don't use it as a tool for hiring.
So we just have to access number one. Number two,
doctor joy, something I've done in my real life. Anyone listening,
did you all just starting to negotiate in some things
(28:35):
in your raises and your bonuses when you are please
don't do this if you're not the best at your job. Okay,
so that's my carry. I got to be sharp. So
I was really really good when I was working at
the college, and I can say that when complained about it.
I really love my job. And I realized that the
metrics that were set up for bonuses and raises that
(28:57):
were just a little low for me. And I was
doing the work of like two or three reps. I
was working in college admissions, and I just simply asked,
I said, hey, listen, just wondering if there's a space
for a couple extra thousand for my bonus this year,
said my student loan payments have gone up. That was
my sact words. I just asked. But I was really
(29:18):
good at my job, and I said, please don't answer now.
I say, if you want to mean about it and
get back to me. I'm laughing because that was a
lot of audacity in my twenty something years alife. But girl,
my payments went up. I needed to acts right, and
they came back and say yes. So I don't know.
I'm just saying some unconventional conversations might need to happen
(29:38):
this season because employers want to retain good talent, right, Okay,
So if someone's listening that's not eligible for public service
on forgiveness and they already do charitable good work and
they want to have their own nonprofit, Like, don't just
start a nonprofit for the sake of getting your loans forgiven.
But if you have a nonprofit or you're starting one
(30:00):
and you have a board, you've taken the time to
formalize it legally and you're compliant, your board member could
sign off for you to get credit towards public service
loan forgiveness. So there are quite a few thousand people
we've helped with this. What I appreciate is I know
that we impact change because I noticed that the studentad
dot gov website started changing their verbiage around what to
(30:22):
do if you have your own nonprofit and how to
be compliant. I was like, I know we impacted some
things in the world. You get tell me nothing. But anyway, Also,
at this time, we were doing a lot of work
with the Biden administration and Secretary of Cardona or how
we miss them so much, So it wasn't unbeknownst to
me that there could have been someone on our free
class hearing us talk about that, because we do have
(30:43):
people that, especially those that are listening to your podcasts
that are therapists. You know, sometimes it's hard for therapists
to get qualified for PSL left because they're doing private work.
But what if you're listening and you have your own
nonprofit and you do do great work in the community,
could one from your boards sign off to be able
to attest to you working in this nonprofit. Just thought.
(31:06):
If we're thinking about going back to school, I think
what I see is that a lot of my older
students that are going back for a master's or a
doctoral degree feel a little like embarrassed, if you will,
or a little ashamed for going towards scholarships because they
feel like that's not something for older people, and it's
like who gave you that? I like to take that
(31:27):
away from them today, so that a way this year
and go apply for some money. So we have something
in our community called don't be weird. And I say
this to my students. People say the all the time,
Doctor Lewis. When I worked at the hospital in twenty fifteen,
I left there, But I don't know if they liked
me when I worked there, Like did you work did
(31:48):
you work there for thirty hours? Or your student loans
and good standing? Did you work there? Yes? Like, go
get your paperwork signed, and let's get this credit towards forgiveness.
So I do want to say that, because I didn't
say that early. Anyone listening that worked in a qualifying
field nonprofit or not for profit two thousand and seven.
In twenty and twenty two, you can go back to
(32:08):
your employer you work there at least thirty hours a
week and have them sign off a testing that you
work there. It doesn't matter even if you never made
a student loan payment, as long as you work there,
your student loans were good standing, you worked there for
thirty hours a week, you can still get credit towards forgiveness.
And that that program public service on forgiveness because people
will forget that they work places, or they think because
(32:28):
they left and they don't remember leaving on the best terms,
or did you work there? Where are you're a good
standing thirty hours a week? Go get your credit? You
know what I mean? People we get forgiven a week
with that program, about like sixty people a week get
forgiven just for that one. They got to go do
the work right, they got to go get a sign.
Then one lady, oh my god, God bless her, almost
blocked her. She kept messaging me and she just kept saying,
(32:52):
I just feel uncomfortable reaching out to them. It's been
so long ago. I told her, I said, this is
my last time responding. I said, you need to go
do the work all right, fast work I'm speaking at
I think invest fast or something I don't know. And
she like flew in just to give me a hug,
and she said, thank you for not blocking me. She said,
I wanted to tell you because you motivated me to
(33:13):
go and to get my paperwork signed. She got two
hundred and fifty thousand forgiven. So we were say in
our community, don't be weird, go get your paywork cred.
So anyone listening, I'm telling you right now that has
some work history that they have not claimed towards forgiveness
and that window is still open to get that paperwork sign.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
So where did you start this process? Like is this
something that still exists on the studioa dotm website? So
what should people look for to like maybe check on
this studenta.
Speaker 2 (33:40):
Dot up and then type in TEPSL left so Temporary
Expanded Public Service Loan Forgiveness. The form will come up
and then you just go to your You want to
fill out the first one or two pages, but there's
an employer section. All we need is their name, their email,
their phone number, their signature they're testing. The middle hours
(34:00):
a week is thirty hours a week for that time
period two thousand and seven to twenty twenty two. Okay,
here's the next question. Well, what if they closed? What
if my manager no longer works there? Errol, don't you
know it's something called Facebook LinkedIn Instagram. Most times we're
in connection with our old employers and some capacity. But
go find the people that used to work in management
(34:22):
HR at those jobs.
Speaker 1 (34:25):
So it doesn't need to be like your direct boss.
It could be somebody who was in HR over the
entire company that didn't even have any And even if
you never knew them, they should still have your records, right,
so they can still pull it up and say, yes,
I can see this person worked there from this date.
Speaker 2 (34:39):
To this day. Doctor Joey. There's a lot of women
that listen to this podcast. Ladies. If somebody was coming
after your men, he was fuying her. But pull up
somebody listening. Let's say they owe three hundred thousand study loans.
Act like the person to this signature owes you three
hundred thousand dollars, because they do. We need to get
(35:00):
rid of these student loans. Go find someone to sign this.
You want it to be if possible with signature, or
you can like email the form. They could scan it back.
In my experience, like, but not to be funny, you
might need to pull up on the job, like, go
get a signature. Yeah, three hundred thousand is on the
line here, You've got time. So that's why I tell
people when we start framing it that way, you'd be
(35:23):
surprised we saw all these signatures coming through our community.
Speaker 1 (35:27):
I love that.
Speaker 2 (35:28):
I love that I'm here to be respected. So why
I'm pleasant, I'm very straightforward in this community because these
are adults that we do not have time to coddle
in the world. Their student loan forgiveness is dependent upon
home buying. It's depending upon the people that are counting
on them. So why we do not have the time
to baby people in this community. So yes, we're giving
it to straight today.
Speaker 1 (35:49):
Yes, So I love the example that you're giving me
because I do think like you mentioned, right, like, there
are so many stories that we create in our heads
that are not based in any truth, but are often
based in fear or like anxiety or insecurity. Are there
other things that you find yourself kind of having to
challenge people around in the best interests of you know,
kind of going after their money or getting the support
(36:09):
they need.
Speaker 2 (36:09):
This is True Therapy podcast And by the way, I
really do love your brodcast. Listen, this is up here
near over with me, honey. So there's this conversation with
money that I was having with myself that I didn't
know I was having. Now I'm working some stuff out
because I was telling my therapists, but from going from
overdrafting like I used to overdraft my account, like I
planned for that all right, so my account is overdraft
(36:32):
to now I don't overdraft. Now I'm in surplus. I
do very well with money, right, but there's still some
broke behaviors that are showing up in my life, right,
Like why is this still showing up? And it's because
even though I have some money, and even though I
pay my bills on all the pay you know, there's still
a thing that I haven't let go, which is a
scarcity mindset. And so what I'm seeing here with those
(36:54):
that are figuring out their student loans. Some people, yes,
cannot afford to pay their stud loans, Yes I agree,
but there are some people who can. And that there's
this old stigma that you don't have to pay them back.
You're not going to pay them back. You may not
be using the degree, why should you pay it back?
And the only person that's hurting is themselves. You're hurting
you right now. If you're listening, you're hurting you. You're
(37:16):
not keeping up with your counterparts who are in the
world that are buying homes, investment properties, crypto whatever, we're
doing right with our moneyes and we have to doctor Joey.
We've got to start having some real conversations to say,
let's figure out what we can afford. Let's figure out
what we can do with our student loans so we're
(37:36):
not left behind in this ecosystem. Because the student loans
shows up with the credit, it shows up with the
home buying, it shows up when it's time to invest,
it shows up if your child needs you later on.
So we've got to overcome these conversations about money with ourselves,
and I think that for anyone that truly believes in therapy,
(37:56):
I would like for them to ask themselves what are
their thoughts about money this year and let that be
a conversation to work through with their therapists, because it's
starting to play a role into what people are are
not doing with these loans. So what's coming up for
me with our clients is we're not therapist. Let me
be clear, Okay, So we always take it back to
(38:17):
what is showing on student a dot gov and what
happens is before we can even talk about what a
payment could look like and figure out, you got to
hear the client for ten minutes talk about the shame
around what they borrowed or the feelings about what they
borrowed or and we let people talk. But the theme
is people it's like they feel bad. We want to
(38:38):
move them from feeling bad to empowerment to going to
doing something about this. So that's what's coming up a
lot for us right now. There's a lot of shame
around what people owe.
Speaker 1 (38:46):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, and I think just historically we
know this, right like, there's a lot of shame just
around money, I think in general in our community, right,
like and and it does them from the scarcity and
like us just not having it historically, right, And so
now even if you do have some, they're all these
old messages, old stories that really need to be reconstructed.
Something you said made me think of For a long time,
(39:08):
people thought about student loans as good debt, right, like,
this is not something that you have to worry about, like, oh,
you can pay the least amount. And so I'm glad
that you keep bringing us back to like no, no, no, y'all,
Like this shows up on your credit report, Like there's
not a separate credit report that exists only for like
student loan stuff. It's all lumped in together with like
credit card and anything else that you have accumulated.
Speaker 2 (39:30):
They're using defaulted loans as a metric they as in
government officials to not give people government clearances or jobs. Okay,
you could have and this is what's really crazy. You
could have went to school, you could have did, and
if you ever default on a student loan, you could
block yourself from a clearance with the government, even as
(39:51):
a contractor. And so that's keeping a lot of our
black and brown people from advancing because they didn't know.
Like I'm sharing it on this podcast. This happened like
in the last year at least like fifty of our
clients reported that they lost a job because of it, Like,
so they got hired. I'll use an example, Lackey Martin,
contractor of the government hires you, loves you, excited about you.
(40:13):
You can't pass the security clearance because of the default
is still a long yeah, yeah, what do you want
to do the like Also you can't like get it
out of default and like being reapplied, but you defaulted
at least once in your life. I feel like being
more talked about because people are going back into repayment
and are finding out a surge of it because now
people can actually be in default and that wasn't the
(40:36):
case in like the last five years.
Speaker 1 (40:37):
Mm hmm, got it. There's so many more questions, but
I do want to I don't want to take up
your whole day, but I do want to make sure
we address you know, instead of going into default, Like
if you realize, okay, I just got laid off, this
is going to be difficult for me. What should people
do instead of defaulting on loans? Like what kinds of
options do you have.
Speaker 2 (40:56):
First of let's just take a depreath, because life happens
right and you are not the lay off. It's about
tell people like stop to joy the layoff, be the layup. Okay, pocus.
Speaker 1 (41:07):
Great.
Speaker 2 (41:08):
But what I want people to know is that if
they can remember, because life is lifeing, they would go
into student hay dot GUV under the loan repayment tab,
click the income driven application and they're just going to
do an update or a new application. And there's a
question that says do you have taxable income? The answer
would be no. So you go through the applications like
on page three or four, do you have taxtble income? No.
(41:30):
You have to then check where it says do you
want your loan provider to do a manual review of
your income? You have to hit yes. Okay, so income
change or taxable income no, manual review? Yes? Has there
been any changes with your income? Yes? And then says
do you want your loan provider to do a manual review? Yes?
(41:52):
Do you have taxable income no? That's it so very
important how you answer those questions because those questions will
then trigger you to have a zero dollar payment for
the year. So that way you don't go into default.
They require no payment of you because we're saying that
there's a life change, there's no taxtbal income, We're fine.
So that's important for people to hear because if not,
(42:14):
most people won't do anything. They're in a headspace and
then they go into default and the application could have
taken care of that.
Speaker 1 (42:21):
Okay, I appreciate you sharing that and walking us through
those tips.
Speaker 2 (42:23):
Yeah, God's go like this. Let me say this, hopefully
people stay in touch with me after this episode because
every Monday apm eest we do a free class where
we literally log in the student aight dot gov together
and we see what's going on together. After I'm not
making this up. Every two weeks, they're changing that website
and application, so they're like re ordering the questions, very sneaky.
(42:45):
I don't like it because you might have heard me
say this before, but now you got to go click
another place. And so we just want people to stay
connected with us. And literally we have people that show
up for the last year every Monday because stuff is
changing all of the time. Where would you find out
about these updates? It didn't get published anywhere, it didn't
get published on the website and didn't get published on
(43:06):
the news website. So it's like unless you're in there
clicking around, you wouldn't know.
Speaker 1 (43:11):
So necard Lewis, you've mentioned this a couple of times.
I definitely want to make sure we know where to
point people, So where can people stay connected with you
to find out about the classes and all the things that.
Speaker 2 (43:19):
You offer, So we act like a news reporter. Our
Instagram page, the student Loan Doctor is where it's my
favorite social media platform for where I put up like
ninety second to three minute clips of what's happening in
the world right. And then outside of that Monday nights,
they can register through the Instagram page or the website
is doctor Please help Me dot com. It's a free class.
(43:40):
You don't have to pay to be there. It's about
a two hour class and we literally teach you from
the rooty to the two D re payment plans forgiveness programs.
Let's log in together. You'd be surprised people put in
the chat. I haven't logged in four years, so they're
filling in power right. And then from there, if we
can help them, we will. But most times people just
need to be in an environment that's safe, that we're
(44:01):
all tracking the same way. Sometimes I do a poll
like I might do one tonight that says how much
do you all ow? I do that sometimes because I
need people to see you ain't the only one that
got five hundred thousand, you know, like last month we
got a guy forgiving nine hundred and ninety seven thousand
dollars right, that's right at a million, and we didn't
make him fel bad about it. So we want anyone
(44:23):
from the little bit to the lot in class so
that they can just learn without pressure and then you
go in the world and figure out what you need
to do. So I really love the community we're creating.
Nobody's showing up weird, nobody's being no bully. We actually
set the tone for class. I love doing that. If
you show up me where you will be dropped from
the zoom never to return. We don't have those issues,
(44:44):
and it's a safe face and people you could see
with their notebooks taking their notes and really participating and
playing along. And then I just feel really proud that
we're a part of educating the community at large about
their student loans and before our class, I just love
to say there was not a lot of people that
were talking about this topic. Honey, don't mix this in
(45:05):
with credit either. We're not that, Like, we just want
to talk about student loans, right. And then I love
that we are Finally, we've been in business now for
ten years, doctor Joy. We're doing press like CNN, we
just the ABC World News. We're doing some really big
stuff in the world. And I'm like, we aren't that
because we show up every day all day. I had
to put my appoint at that for the world to
(45:27):
do my little update because see you, I remember and
you know about this, like when something big comes out,
people's brain can't always process it and they're looking for
someone they trust to give them the facts right in
a safe space and then they can go on with
their day. So that's what we do. So when you
came to see my little AI advertire, mind your business
because that work to day that by makeup wasn't done
(45:50):
or something. And I got a little AI that looked
like me. I say, it's Ai. I'm be trying to
trick nobody say powered by Ai Yasha because when news
comes out, who am I to go get you or
buy lashes done or something. Christen just take information going
about to day.
Speaker 1 (46:04):
I love it when it's definitely needed right now. So
thank you so much for that service because it sounds
like it's helping a lot of people, and we will
be sure to include that information in the show, not
so that people can get connected with you and your coaches,
so that they can learn even more about how to
take care of themselves and their financial health.
Speaker 2 (46:19):
And thank you so much for your platform. I'm telling you, girl,
you done gotten me through some stuff, but you have help,
and so I think your platform is just so important
because it's a lot like this is not yesterday's yesterday, yes,
and you're trying to process personal relationships, professional relationships, the
different roles you wear, Oh you got your finances on fire,
like who are we? And sometimes it's just good to
(46:42):
just take a moment, take a beat, to be like
is it really that serious? And then I feel like
your voice is so befitting, Like I don't know, God
gave me the voice because I'm like, if doctor Joyce's son,
go get some shy tea and work out the problems.
So just continue, doctor Joyce. I don't know how much
longer you want to do this work, but we love
itppreciate the work that you're doing.
Speaker 1 (47:01):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (47:01):
I was so thrilled with the invitation. It really was.
I mean, this is like my Oprah moment. I mean
the Oprah you could call me though. Nice. No, no,
don't forget it.
Speaker 1 (47:09):
Confused, Okay, we will still accept the invitation.
Speaker 2 (47:11):
But I love, love, love the work that you're doing.
You've helped me out many times. You got a lot
of people say for being cussed out, the Lord is
doing a work in you. Because I said, what did
she say before? I call this? Persons back?
Speaker 1 (47:22):
There you go, there you go. I appreciate that. Thank you,
and thank you for spending some time with us today.
I appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (47:28):
Yes, thanks so much.
Speaker 1 (47:29):
Of course, I'm so happy doctor Lewis was able to
join us for today's episode. To learn more about her,
or to register for her free Monday night student loan classes,
or stay up to date on policy changes, be sure
to visit the show notes at Therapy for Black Girls
dot com slash Session four fifty one, and don't forget
(47:50):
to text this episode to two of your girls right
now and tell them to check it out. Did you
know that you could leave us a voicemail with your
questions or suggestions for the podcast. If you have toime
topics you think we should discuss, drop us a message
at Memo dot fm slash Therapy for Black Girls and
let us know what's on your mind. We just might
feature it on the podcast. If you're looking for a
therapist in your area, visit our therapist directory at Therapy
(48:13):
for Blackgirls dot com slash directory. Don't forget to follow
us over on Instagram at Therapy for Black Girls and
join us in our Patreon channel for exclusive updates, behind
the scenes content, and much more. You can join us
at community dot Therapy for Blackgirls dot com. This episode
was produced by Elise Ellis, Indechubu and Tyree Rush. Editing
(48:34):
was done by Dennis and Bradford. Thank y'all so much
for joining me again this week. I look forward to
continuing this conversation with you all real soon. Take good care.
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