If you’re excited about starting school soon but still can’t figure out a way to meet all of your tuition costs and fees for books, housing and food, you may want to consider a federal loan. Federal loans are given to students and families who can demonstrate financial need and are generally easier to acquire than traditional loans from a bank because of more flexible payment options and lower interest rates. They can be a great way to pay for a complete program or offset the price of tuition after scholarships, grants and other financial aid. To learn about two types of federal student loans, the Perkins and Stafford loans, read below.

The Perkins loan is a loan for college and university students and the undergraduate or graduate level. The loan involves contributions from both the federal government and the student’s school, but you may still need to supplement this loan with other scholarships and tuition assistance. Currently, 1,800 postsecondary schools participate in the Perkins loan program, so if you are considering applying for this aid, you will want to verify that the school you’re applying to is one of the participating schools. While federal government funds make up most of the loan you receive, your school must also make a contribution. Your school is also responsible for determining the amount of your total loan. Generally, though, students can borrow up to $4,000 for every year you are an undergraduate student, with a maximum total amount of $20,000. Graduate and professional students can earn up to $6,000 per year, with a cap of $40,000. That $40,000 also includes any money you received from Perkins loans when you were an undergraduate student.

As long as you have been at least a part-time status, you will not have to start repaying your loan until nine months after graduation. Perkins loans can also be canceled, though there are some stipulations that may vary by school.

The Stafford loan features lower interest rates and offers students the choice of paying interest while they’re in school or deferring payment until after they’ve graduated. To apply for a Stafford loan, you must be a U.S. citizen or U.S. permanent resident and plan to be at least a part-time student. If you have received any other loans or grants to fund your education, you must also be in good standing with those organizations. All applicants must also fill out and submit a FAFSA form, which stands for Free Application for Federal Student Aid, and on it, you will determine your dependency status. This form must be completed and turned in before the deadline. If you choose to have a subsidized Stafford loan, you and your family must be determined by your school to have financial need.

There are two types of Stafford loans: the Federal Family Education Loan Program (FFELP) and the Federal Direct Student Loan Program (FDSLP). The FFELP loans are actually issued by private organizations or lenders, like banks, but are guaranteed by the federal government. The FDSLP loans are actually granted to the student directly from the U.S. government. Whether you have an FFELP or FDSLP loan, you can choose to have your Stafford loan subsidized or unsubsidized. The interest on subsidized loans are paid by the federal government while you’re still in school, and you don’t have to pay it back. Students and their parents must demonstrate real financial need to have this type of Stafford loan. Unsubsidized loans mean that students have to pay all of the interest on their loan, but they do not have to start payments until six months after graduation. If the student drops below part-time student status, he or she has three months to begin payments on the loan. As of the 2008-2009 school year, subsidized interest rates for the Stafford loan were 6.00%. Unsubsidized/graduate rates were 6.80%. The unsubsidized rate is projected to stay the same until at least 2013.

Before applying for a Stafford loan, understand that you may not be able to pay your entire tuition with the loan, especially if you plan to attend a private university or an out-of-state public university, where tuition costs may be much higher. As of the 2008-2009 school year, dependent students can earn $5,500 their first year, $6,500 their second year, and $7,500 for their third year and any years after that until graduation. Independent students can receive significantly more, especially if they are in graduate or professional school.

Online education is designed to make academic and professional training more accessible to those who live too far away to commute to the schools of their choice, make fitting in a continuing education or higher degree program easier for working professionals, and allow all types of students to manage unique school schedules that allow them to begin or advance a career that is relevant to the current workforce. Unfortunately, some illegal organizations have taken advantage of the ease with which students research and register for online programs and have set up scamming operations. One of the most common types of online education scams is diploma mills, groups that hide behind the facade of being an online university and print out fake diplomas to unsuspecting students.

Diploma mills have been able to succeed because they can easily set up a legitimate looking website that describes training programs or academic degree programs. These organizations can even fake "real" student or alumni testimonials, bolstering up their claim to being a valid online university. If a prospective student visits the site, he or she may not even be able to tell that the site is a front for education fraud. Students who live in another part of the country or even a different part of the world have no way of visiting the school’s main office to verify the school is legitimate. Diploma mills rely on prospective students that accept the website as substantial proof for the school’s existence.

To fight diploma mills, the U.S. Department of Education has posted its own website informing the public about how these organizations operate and how you can spot them during your online school research. The government recommends that students first look for the school’s accreditation status. Schools that are accredited will be proud to post that information on their website. The best kind of accreditation to look for is regional accreditation, which means that the school has met standards set forth by one of the regional accrediting councils, which itself has been approved by the Council for Higher Education Accreditation and the U.S. Secretary of Education. Two other popular accrediting bodies are the Distance Education and Training Council and the Accrediting Council of Independent Colleges and Schools. If the school you are researching posts information about another type of accrediting agency, you can check for it in this database, published on the U.S. Department of Education website. There, you can type in the name of the institution to see if it appears anywhere in the database. You can also try to match it to the accrediting agency listed on the school’s website to check its claim.

To help prospective students recognize a diploma mill or fake university, review these red flags, which the U.S. Department of Education and the Better Business Bureau have found helpful. Some signs that could indicate fraudulent behavior include the promise to award degrees in a very short amount of time, especially an amount of time that is drastically different than at a university you know to be accredited; tuition rates that are set up on a per-degree basis or discounts for enrolling in multiple degree programs. Accredited institutions charge by credit hours, course, or semester, according to ED.gov. Another important sign to watch out for are school addresses that only include a mail drop box or a P.O. box number, which may indicate that the alleged school does not have any real offices or headquarters. The U.S. Department of Education recommends that if students still question the legitimacy of a school that seems too good to be true, they contact the Better Business Bureau or the state attorney general’s office, who can run a check on the institution.

Another type of scam involving online education is the claim to be accredited by unrecognized organizations. Just because a school boasts accreditation does not mean that it is recognized by the Secretary of Education or the Council for Higher Education Accreditation. You can find a list of unrecognized accrediting agencies here.

Students interested in pursuing a degree program at an online university should also watch out for foreign diploma mills and foreign institutions. The Secretary of Education does not recognize foreign institutions, but some of the accrediting agencies that are approved by the Secretary of Education do recognize foreign institutions. If you are unsure about the quality of your foreign degree compared to a degree from a U.S. institution, you can have a private credential evaluation company do the research. Their findings should satisfy other U.S. institutions and employers.