Access Group

Access Group is a nonprofit student loan provider that specializes in graduate and professional student loans. The company provides federally-guaranteed Federal Stafford, PLUS and Consolidation loans through the Federal Family Education Loan Program, as well as private education loans for graduate and professional students. Access Group also provides debt management materialsand presentations to students and schools across the United States.

In order to make law school financing more accessible, the “Law Assured Access Program” began in 1983, under the direction of the Law School Admission Council. This program offered two federally-guaranteed education loans to students attending ABA-approved law schools. In following years, a private loan program, the Law Access Loan, was created to supplement the federal loans. These programs were incorporated in 1993 as a separate nonprofit organization: Law Access, Inc.

Law Access, Inc. eventually expanded its loan program to provide federal and private student loans not only to law students, but also to business, medical, dental, health and other graduate students. To reflect this growth of programs and services, Law Access, Inc. began doing business as The Access Group, and in 1997, officially changed its name to Access Group, Inc.

Over the years, Access Group has established a history of industry innovations, such as offering the first private Bar Examination Loan to help cover the expenses of students studying for and taking the Bar Examination, creating the first over-the-phone application in student lending, and offering the first fully interactive graduate student loan application on the Web.