NPR reported Oct. 29 that a lawsuit filed Oct. 28 challenges how the U.S. Department of Education (ED) applied its 2025 loan-relief expansion after a Brooks Institute borrower was denied.
NPR reported that Student Defense brought the case for Kendrick Gaussoin, a former Brooks student, and potentially other borrowers. According to NPR, Brooks closed in August 2016, after Gaussoin began an eight-month leave in December 2015. He applied for a discharge on Aug. 23, 2026, and received a denial dated Aug. 31, 2026; NPR said the letter cited standard eligibility rules rather than the expanded dates. NPR also reported that Gaussoin owes nearly $22,000, including interest, and his mother, Christine Gaussoin, owes about $28,000 in Parent PLUS loans. Her discharge request was also denied, the outlet reported.
ED’s Jan. 16, 2025, announcement extended the eligibility date to May 6, 2015, for closed campuses then owned by Career Education Corporation, including Brooks Institute. Eligible borrowers generally had to apply. The department also directed Federal Student Aid to inform borrowers of their eligibility and pursue automatic discharges for some borrowers whose schools closed from 2013 through 2020 and who did not enroll elsewhere within three years.
Federal rules provide for discharge when a borrower, or a student whose parent borrowed on their behalf, could not finish a program because the school closed and the applicable eligibility requirements are met. The education secretary may extend the standard window in exceptional circumstances. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) describes ordinary windows of 90, 120 or 180 days, depending on when a loan was disbursed. For an approved discharge, the borrower no longer owes the eligible balance, and previous payments may be refunded.
The Education Department’s inspector general documented an earlier extension in 2019 for students at schools owned by the Dream Center, under then-Education Secretary Betsy DeVos. Separately, GAO found that about 246,000 borrowers attended 1,106 colleges that closed from 2010 through 2020. Among borrowers affected by those closures, 43% neither completed their programs nor transferred to another college.
In a statement to NPR, ED spokesperson Ellen Keast criticized the Biden-era expansion, saying it had “used the stroke of a (digital) pen to inappropriately expand the closed-school discharge period.” NPR quoted Gaussoin describing the school’s closure: “It was very eerie. Everyone was crying.”
