I paid my student loans for 10 years and was denied loan forgiveness. Now that the union is fighting for my financial security, I feel empowered.
I always knew I wanted to be an art teacher because my high school art teacher changed my life. The art room in the basement of my high school was like a little cave of safeness; I saw what could happen when a caring adult comes into your life.
I had been paying my student loans for 10 years when I applied for the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program in 2017. I had been told that if I made 120 qualifying payments and continued to serve my community, my debt would be forgiven. But after 10 years, my application was denied because one of my loans didn’t qualify. I was told that my qualifying payments had been reset to zero and I would have to keep paying for another 10 years.
In early 2019, as a middle school teacher in Washington Heights, I got an email from the UFT that mentioned the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program and asked me to fill out an American Federation of Teachers survey if I had been denied loan forgiveness.
I filled out the form, but I thought nothing would ever come of it, that it was just data collection. The next day, someone from the union called me and asked me to tell my story to an attorney. I thought, “What can you do for me? I’ve already exhausted all my outlets.” But the lawyer told me I qualified to be part of a class action lawsuit the AFT was filing against Betsy DeVos and the federal Department of Education. The Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program had only approved .03 percent of applications for loan forgiveness. The program was a hoax. We were lied to.
I traveled to Washington, D.C., to meet with the union’s general counsel and shared my story at a press conference with AFT President Randi Weingarten. In September, I testified before Congress. That will be a milestone of my life — to have been empowered for the AFT to tell me, “Say what you need to say and we will have your back. We trust you.”
I’ve been alone for so long without any voice. For years, I would be on the phone with loan companies over and over again with no answers. Now I feel like I’m not alone. There are plenty of teachers who didn’t get the opportunity to be a part of this lawsuit. They didn’t do anything differently than I did, but they don’t have a team of people behind them because they’re not in a union.
Kelly Finlaw is an art teacher at IS 528 in Manhattan.
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