The company has already shut down 1,400 websites attempting frauds on student loans this year

The Student Loans Company is contacting some of its customers by telephone amid fears of a fraud attack.

The company says it is calling those customers whom it has “identified as being at risk of having their details compromised”.

The student loan system is facing sustained “phishing” attacks, with 1,400 websites shut down this year.

Customers are being told to be “vigilant with their personal details”.

The company says it cannot confirm whether or not any private details of customers have been hacked – arguing that it does not want to supply any further information which could be useful to fraudsters.

‘Ongoing enquiry’

It also declines to say how many customers are involved as “this is an ongoing enquiry”.

But it says the calls to specific customers are being made as a “preventative measure”.

The Student Loans Company has four million customers – administering loans to current students and repayments from former students.

But in response to what is believed to be a phishing-style attack – where fraudsters attempt to obtain information such as by email – the company has been directly calling some of its customers.

“We are currently contacting a number of students by telephone who we have identified as being at risk of having their details compromised, to advise them of the necessary security steps they should follow to ensure their details are protected,” said Heather Laing, fraud prevention and detection manager for the Student Loans Company.

“We would advise all students to be vigilant with their personal details.

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Two gardening students have been recognised by the Royal Horticultural Society.

The society, which hosts the annual Chelsea Flower Show, has given awards to Leicestershire students Sarah Morley and Christine Hammond.

Sarah, from Woodhouse Eaves, received the Centenary Prize for the highest achievement in the RHS Level 2 Certificate in Horticulture, which she studied at Brooksby Melton College.

Sarah manages a software business within a global engineering consultancy, but she also has a full allotment and takes part in the Woodhouse Eaves Horticultural Show, where she has received the prize for the best allotment.

Christine, from Leicester, was awarded the Anne Menhinick Prize for the highest achievement in the RHS Level 2 Certificate in Horticulture for someone who is under 30 years of age.

Christine is a civil servant but took the qualification because she hopes to start her own plant nursery.

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Editor’s note: Bridging Differences returns today from its holiday break.

Dear Deborah, While we were on holiday break, Dennis Van Roekel and Wendy Kopp co-signed an opinion piece in USA Today, setting off a heated controversy.

It was a surprising statement, mainly because of its authors and what they represent. Here was the president of the nation’s largest teachers’ union, with more than 3 million members, joining in solidarity with the founder of an organization that recruits and assigns several thousand college graduates each year for short-term commitments to teaching jobs (many of them in non-union charter schools). One can only imagine the intense editorial negotiations between the staffs of these two powerful organizations.

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University of California, Riverside lecturer Reiko Sato will escort 11 UCR students on a 10-day trip to Tohoku University in Sendai, Japan. The students leave on December 10, 2011.

RIVERSIDE, Calif. (www.ucr.edu) – Building on a long-time friendship between the cities of Riverside and Sendai, Japan, University of California, Riverside lecturer Reiko Sato will lead a group of 11 UCR undergraduate students on a 10-day trip to Tohoku University as part of an exchange program between the two campuses.

Sato, who teaches Japanese language courses in the Department of Comparative Literature and Foreign Languages, said she hopes the students will have the opportunity to teach the Japanese people about America, as well as to learn about Japanese culture and more about the region that was devastated by a 9.0 earthquake and subsequent tsunami on March 11, 2011.

The trip was made affordable by a pair of $1,000-per-student scholarships from Tohoku University and the UCR International Education Program’s (IEP) Seung Family Scholarship Fund.

“The scholarships make it so the trip is almost free for students,” Sato said. “Most o Read full post…

Problems with the Education Department’s online system for managing student debt have cost taxpayers millions of dollars and left thousands of borrowers in financial limbo, unable to put their defaults behind them.

The department acknowledges the problems and says it’s working to fix them.

Under federal law, defaulted borrowers who make nine on-time repayments on their student loans can have their loans restored to good standing and their credit histories cleared. Borrowers with such “rehabilitated” loans are eligible for deferments, forbearances, and income-based repayment rates, and can also receive new federal student aid.

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Hundreds of jobs will be lost in a bid to save further cuts to dwindling school budgets, it has emerged.

More than 300 posts could be axed over the next two years by the education authorities in the areas of management and administration.

John McGrath, deputy secretary of the Department of Education, said the move was necessary to “protect the school budget as much as possible”.

He made the comments during a briefing at yesterday’s education committee on the findings from the Department of Finance and Personnel performance and delivery unit (PEDU).

A review of school meals and home to school transport by PEDU has also identified areas where further efficiency savings can be made.

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