PLUS loans are approved for some parents who cannot afford to repay them, several college financial aid officers and financially

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问题     PLUS loans are approved for some parents who cannot afford to repay them, several college financial aid officers and financially strapped parents say. They hold the view that many financially strapped and unsophisticated parents may be taking PLUS loans to help their children out now, not realizing that how much trouble awaits them if they start missing payments.
    The Department of Education says it is simply awarding PLUS loans according to the rules set by Congress: Federal law "provides no authority for the Department to deny an applicant a PLUS loan based on their perceived ability to repay the loan," a department spokesman explained via E-mail. Instead, parents can borrow as long as they don’t have what the law calls " adverse credit. " That low standard only cuts off parents with serious credit problems such as a bankruptcy, lien or foreclosure in the last five years, or a bill currently more than 90 days overdue.
    Because no one knows how many parents are taking college loans they can’t afford, there is debate over how big—or small—the problem might be.
    Nancy Lynn Hoover, director of financial aid at Denison University, thinks very few parents are getting in over their heads. She said many college aid officers may have noticed a difference in approval standards this year because on July 1, the federal government took over handling of all federal college loan applications. Before that, private banks, many of which had tougher lending standards for PLUS loans, were paid by the government to process most federal college loan applications. " I personally have mentored over 100 schools’ switch to the federal loan management system," Hoover says. " If it were a situation of much magnitude, I believe I would hear it. "
    But even a few loans to parents who can’t afford them at each of the more than 4,000 colleges in the U. S. would mean financial crises for thousands of families. Last fiscal year, about 737,000 parent PLUS loans were approved, out of an estimated 1.1 million applications. If a similar number apply this coming year, and the government continues its current policy, it will likely approve 825,000 parent PLUS loans.
    Sarah Bauder, assistant vice president of enrollment services and financial aid at the University of Maryland, said the PLUS approval rate for parents of her students has jumped from about 80 percent to 97 percent since the switch to the federal direct lending program. She says she knows at least a few of the parents who have been approved are jobless or teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. " Look at the housing market scenario. Five to seven years down the road, we’re going to be in the same situation for parent loans," Bauder warns.  
We can infer from the first paragraph that______.

选项 A、PLUS loans are specially designed for families in financial difficulty
B、college financial aid officers hold a cautious attitude to PLUS loans
C、the parents have doubts whether the loans can help their children out
D、unsophisticated parents may confront more financial problems

答案B

解析 推断题。根据第一段所述,大学财政援助人员和部分家长认为接受政府借贷的部分家长根本就没有偿还能力。尽管目前可以缓解困难,但一旦开始延缓偿还,就会面临诸多麻烦。由此可见,他们对政府这项贷款并不乐观,而是持谨慎态度。因此,[B]项所述符合题意。四个选项中较易排除[A]项,原文只是说政府向经济困难家长发放追加贷款,但并未表示这项贷款是专为他们设计的,故[A]项错误。[C]项偏离了此段讨论的中心,家长所担心的不是贷款不能给学生提供帮助,而是今后的偿还问题,故[C]不符合原文。[D]项曲解了原文unsophisticated parents…not realizing that how much trouble awaits them,此句的意思并不是说没经验家长财政问题更多,而是说他们更容易贸然接受贷款而陷入麻烦,故[D]也错误。
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