WILKES-BARRE -- A lapse in a federal student loan program is affecting 40,000 college students in Pennsylvania and that includes hundreds in Luzerne County who may not be able to afford tuition next semester.
Some students at Wilkes University walked around campus with a little extra anxiety Friday. They wonder how are they going to pay for next semester's tuition after Congress recently allowed the federal Perkins loan program to lapse.
The program provided low-interest loans to students who have financial need.
"It's one of those loans that it's not a crazy amount as a whole, but the thousand or $2,000 that students receive from this, it really is make or break," said Wilkes senior Anthony Fanucci.
Fanucci spoke at a news conference Friday, hoping Congress will hear his story. He's relied on the federal Perkins loan for all four years at Wilkes.
This lapse won't affect him, but he is still frustrated that it will affect younger students like sophomore Dylan Fox, who is the first in his family to go to college.
"To have that kind of in the back of my mind, how am I going to pay for school? How am I going to return for the fall semester? Or a year or the next five years down the road? I mean it's definitely kept me up at night before," Fox said.
Fox is studying to be a pharmacist and will take out higher interest private loans if he has to to enroll in classes in the fall. Not every student will be able to do that.
"If they can't find another solution I hate to say it, it might come to they have to drop out," said Fox.
About 1,800 students in the Wilkes-Barre area are affected by the lapse of the federal Perkins loan program, that includes 150 students at Wilkes.
"I just want Congress to know that if they don't extend this they are literally stripping a number of students from exponential futures," said Fanucci.
"We have to get this back on track and there is no reason why someone should be prevented from going to college because congress can't get its act together," said U.S. Senator Bob Casey.
Casey hopes to get Congress to reauthorize the federal Perkins loan program in November.