The federal Guaranteed Student Loan programs provide low-interest, long-term loans to students with demonstrated financial need to help them pay for their postsecondary education. The number of loan defaults and the associated federal costs are increasing; this handbook is an effort to protect students, increase accountability, and reduce default costs. The handbook offers postsecondary institutions, lenders, guarantee agencies, accrediting agencies, and states practical suggestions to reduce defaults. The handbook discusses the problem of the rising cost of student loan defaults and examines which students default and why. Individual chapters then address what postsecondary institutions, lenders, guarantee agencies, accrediting agencies, and states can do and what the Federal Government's responsibilities are. It profiles organizations that have employed interesting and innovative approaches to reducing defaults, in the hope that their strategies might stimulate others. Appendices outline borrowers' rights and responsibilities, ramifications of default, a sample repayment table, sample budget worksheets, options for repayment, and a glossary. (JDD)