Wednesday Linkpile compiles, for your information and delight, links to noteworthy news articles pertaining to all things online and higher-educational.

• A July 19, 2011 post on The Chronicle of Higher Education's blog The Ticker announces that "Federal Student-Aid Spending Could Be Cut as Part of Deficit-Reduction Plan." "The plan, which would reduce the deficit by $3.7-trillion through a combination of unspecified spending cuts and revenue increases, could factor into continuing negotiations over raising the nation’s debt ceiling. Lawmakers have only days to reach a deal; on August 2 the federal government will reach its borrowing limit and risk defaulting on its debt."
• "The New Private Student Loan Sheriff Gets to Work," reads the hed to a July 19, 2011 post on The New America Foundation's blog, Higher Ed Watch. "Starting Thursday, there will be, for the first time, a single federal agency in charge of regulating private student loans. The new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) replaces a patchwork of government agencies that for years turned a blind eye to the predatory private loan practices that we at Higher Ed Watch have helped expose since the blog’s start in 2006."
• A July 19, 2011 Investors.com post recounts "The For-Profit Education of Apollo's John Sperling." "Sperling's vision: Provide working adults with a better way to finish college degrees than in night schools that threw them in the same pool with young undergrads."
• A July 18, 2011 Chronicle of Higher Education article brings troubling word that "Community-College Students Perform Worse Online Than Face to Face." "Community-college students enrolled in online courses fail and drop out more often than those whose coursework is classroom-based, according to a new study released by the Community College Research Center at the Teachers College at Columbia University."
• The worm is turning for career-college graduates. "More employers value online degrees"," reads the hed to a July 19, 2011 Atlanta Journal-Constitution article. "A recent survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management and commissioned by eLearners.com [...] found that 87 percent of 449 randomly selected HR professionals viewed online degrees more favorably than they did five years ago. Seventy-nine percent said that they had hired a job applicant with an online degree in the past 12 months."
• A July 19, 2011 San Francisco Chronicle article provides "An Introduction To Stafford Loans." "These loans are available to undergraduate and graduate students and those attending professional schools. Rates are less expensive than other forms of financing (such as private loans or credit cards). The most attractive feature of Stafford loans is that you do not have to make payments on the loan until after graduation. There is no credit check or collateral required either, so this source of funding is open to nearly everybody."
• Penn shows itself mightier. "Keeping Their Distance: Online Higher Ed Conquers the Keystone State." "One Monroe County institution, Northhampton Community College, which has eleven online degree programs on offer, witnessed a 17 percent boost in summer Web course enrollment. This amounts to some 3,300 students studying in 300 sections of distance learning courses."
• Pell Grant woes continue. "Frustration with the Feds," reads the hed to a July 19, 2011 InsideHigherEd.com article. "In sessions on diverse topics here Sunday and Monday, the college administrators who have assembled to talk loans, grants and legislation said they are fed up with a regulatory environment that seems perpetually in flux, from the recent gainful employment and program integrity rules to plans announced in May for another round of rule making on the direct lending program."
• And confusion reigns in the financial aid realm. "Flying Blind: Report Finds Confused Borrowers Often Choose Worst Student Loans." "Clearly, confusion reigns in the area of student lending. Every effort must indeed be made to dispel this confusion. Otherwise, defaults and despair will only increase. It’s a real shame that some of this burden was needlessly taken on. An entering college student’s real education ought to begin not with selecting such fields of study as engineering or business administration, but with solid loan counseling."