I’ve been offered a position contingent on an Interim Clearance being granted. I am worried about being granted a clearance due to an issue I only recently became aware of.
Here is the rundown of my SF-86
Living: Three addresses in the last 10 years, One for all but the last three years. I moved to once in 2015, and then moved again last summer.
Employment: Four jobs total since 2000. The last three (since 2010) as a state government employee (Teacher). Never been fired, reprimanded, or had any negative performance evaluations.
Foreign Travel: Once in 2017 to Costa Rica for 8 days. No contacts/relatives
Legal: Nothing ever, I’ve never even had a speeding ticket.
Drugs: Never
Mental Health: Never
Financial: I’m 37, and I have no debt or open accounts reported on my credit report, liteally, there are only 3 listed ever. I just don’t use credit and prefer to live within the means of my salary. With that in consideration, there is one issue that I hope doesn’t disqualify. I have approximately $5,200 in a student loan that is currently listed as in default with the Department of Education. It is a very unique situation that led to this, and is easily explainable and verifiable. (Below)
In 2015 the loan was thought to have been forgiven as a part of the Teacher Loan Forgiveness Program (34 CFR 682.216). My other student loans were all forgiven under other similar programs with no issues. This program forgives up to $17,500 in student debt if a certified/licensed Mathematics Teacher completes five consecutive years at a low income school. The program requires a mailed paper application which I sent in around June of 2015, after I completed the required five years of teaching. For unknown reasons to me, the processor of the loan for the Department of Education never reviewed or submitted the loan forgiveness application to the DoE. They ultimately placed the loan in default, and sent it back to the DoE for collections. I found all of this out last week when I pulled my credit reports to make sure there are no unknown issues. It also was not obvious on my credit report, as the account shows no “past due balance,” shows “closed,” and there has never been a collections account reported for the defaulted loan. The report did show late payments beginning in late summer 2015, which is what triggered my inquiry into what had happened. After spending most of a morning making calls to all the parties associated with the account, the original account processor said they have no record of the application, and the process was started with the DoE, again, to forgive the loan. A payment plan has been initiated, and the first payment made. These payments will continue until DoE processes the application. This should all be cleared up soon, the loan is still eligable to be forgiven by the DoE, but it can take up to 60 days to process the application.
Also, the issue with the account happened the same summer I moved to another state, and I never realized there was an issue to correct. Prior to the forgiveness application, the loan was in a forbearance status pending the completion of the 5 years teaching and competion of the forgiveness application, and I was not required to make payments on it during that time. So there wasnt an event to where i just stopped paying. I believed the Loan Forgiveness application to have been processed. As i do not use credit, I never had a reason to monitor my credit report, and in my own lapse in judgement, I never followed up on the application status. Finnally, late 2014 - 2015 was a very trying and stressful time for me and my family. I was the victim of a serious domestic violence assault in October 2014. My ex husband strangled, beat, and ultimately shot me in the hip, which resulted in me being hospitalized. This is the main reasons I moved to summer of 2015, the same time I submitted the application. I lived in fear that my ex would make bail and be released pretty much any time from October until I moved in June. I also did not leave a forwarding address because I did not want him to be able to find me. He had already disobeyed the no contact order and continued to write letters, and make phone calls to me while in jail.
So, with all this being said, there is only one thing in my entire life that I think could ever be judged negatively. I think I have a valid justification/mitigation for it, and it is easily verifiable, but from what I have been told, the interim process is completely based upon the judgement of the individual reviewing the initial clearance application. So who knows.