Education Chief Defends Plan to Cut Student Loans

Education Secretary William J. Bennett, defending the Administration’s proposal to curb federal loan guarantees for college students, said Monday that in some cases the cuts simply would force students to “divest” themselves of their stereos, automobiles and time at the beach.

Also, Bennett said, cutbacks to the federal loan programs would hit not students but bankers “most immediately and hardest” because they would lose federal interest payments.

Bennett made his comments during his first news conference as secretary--a wide-ranging session in which he outlined his vision of American education. He vowed to work “actively” to promote President Reagan’s budget proposals in Congress. Reagan’s new budget calls for denying student loan guarantees to students from families with adjusted gross incomes above $32,500 per year.

Although Bennett defended the proposals, one of his senior assistants said during the news conference that the Administration is “willing to negotiate” on the scope of the cuts--reflecting awareness that Congress may be reluctant to curtail a program popular with middle-class taxpayers.

The comment was made by Gary Bauer, undersecretary for planning, budget and evaluation, who added after the news conference that Congress might suggest “a few modifications” to the Administration proposal. “We send these budgets up, and we’re always willing to have a give-and-take with Congress on the details,” he said.

Limit of $4,000

In addition to the $32,500 ceiling for loan guarantees, the Administration has asked Congress to deny grants, work-study or direct loans to any student whose family’s adjusted gross income exceeds $25,000, and to make $4,000 the most federal aid for which a student could qualify in a year.

Bennett said students, parents and college administrators have been “way out of line” in opposing the Administration proposals, which would eliminate about 1 million students from federal college aid programs.

He said the Administration’s aim is to provide for “the neediest group first” and to fight the federal deficit. He conceded that if the proposals are passed, some families with more than one student in college would “have to tighten their belts even further.”

Certain Luxuries

For others, however, the measures would mean only that certain luxuries would have to be cut out, Bennett said.

It would be “divestiture of certain sorts: stereo divestiture, automobile divestiture, three-weeks-at-the-beach divestiture,” he said.

“I do not mean to suggest this will be the case in all circumstances,” the former professor of philosophy said, “but it will, like the rain, fall on the just and unjust alike.”

Turning to his philosophy of education, Bennett invoked opinions ranging from those of Thomas Jefferson to the Gallup Poll in making his case for emphasis on the “fundamentals” of mathematics, English and history.

Bennett, reflecting the Administration’s focus on eliminating federal involvement in education, said the effort to improve education “is principally the American people’s work, not the federal government’s.”

‘Educational Backwaters’

Bennett also warned that schools “cannot hold minority students or minority language students to lower standards or segregate them into educational backwaters while everyone else is placed into the mainstream.”

Under Reagan’s budget proposals, migrant education programs would be cut $49 million and aid for education of immigrants would be cut about $30 million. Both programs affect minorities and students whose first language is not English.

When asked specifically about his views of bilingual programs, Bennett said that while schools should not “interfere with the heritage and legacy of students . . . it is very important to them to learn English as quickly and easily as possible.”