Rose Martinelli, director of admissions and financial aid at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business, shared some good news about the status of international student loans at the school.
In October, Citibank cancelled its CitiAssist loan program with Chicago Booth and several other schools as a result of the economic crisis and shrinking credit market. Domestic students pursuing an MBA were not impacted, but the cancellation of the CitiAssist program brought to an abrupt end loan programs for international students that don’t require a co-signer.
Chicago Booth has been working very closely as part of the university-wide effort to find a solution for its international students, Martinelli reports, exploring both traditional options such as banks and non-conventional sources of funding. “Our goal has been to secure a ‘guaranteed’ loan for our international students at competitive market rates with favorable terms,” she wrote.
The good news is that the school is currently in active discussions with a number of lenders and close to reaching agreement with the first of them, Martinelli said. “While conversations are ongoing, we fully expect that Chicago Booth will have at least one viable loan program for our international MBA students well in advance of fall 2009.” | 
