Cultivating Data-Driven Student Loan Programs

Our Unique Process

Designing a student loan program for a partner requires balancing their business objectives with the needs of schools and families, all while ensuring financial returns are met and regulatory and compliance burdens are managed. This is our area of expertise.

With more than $16.1 billion in loans under management, Monogram's advanced loan origination platform, robust credit databases, and comprehensive loan-performance analytics enable banks, credit unions, affinity groups, and other organizations to offer innovative and more personalized private student loan products.

Our Platform

Monogram’s platform is a fully outsourced, end-to-end private student loan solution that helps lenders generate high-quality assets. It can be customized at each stage of the loan process to ensure you can target risk profiles that align with your portfolio objectives.

    • Proprietary risk scoring models determine repayment terms and payment options

    • Dissemination of loan materials and applications

    • Application intake

    • Customer call center management

    • Application processing and credit underwriting

    • Delivery of credit agreement

    • Disbursement of funds

    • Regulatory and legal compliance

    • Organization of critical resources

    • Structuring of securitization/asset selection

    • Negotiation with transaction parties and coordination with rating agencies

    • Execution and reconciliation

    • Dynamic strategy driven by data and analysis

    • Servicing, billing, account and call center management

    • Collections and recoveries management

    • Trust administration

Continuous Improvement to Credit Modeling

Industry dynamics and increasing college costs have combined to create a significant market opportunity for private student loan providers. Leveraging our proprietary data, we work to continuously improve the lending options available to support your business goals while also meeting your customers’ needs.

Proprietary Data

  • Expansive data set spanning the past 30+ years of the private student loan industry.

  • Rich database with 6M+ decided private student loans.

  • Proprietary characteristics, like cosigner, academic progress and degree type, are used in the risk assessment.

Sophisticated Modeling

  • Intricate model with multiple scorecards based on loan type, cosigner presence and credit history.

  • Experience and data-driven imputation for missing values to maximize lift.

  • Final model significantly outperforms FICO -  the riskiest 50% assigned by the underwriting scorecard captures 85% of defaults while FICO only captures 65%.

Continuous Improvement

  • Regular evaluation of the model ensures peak performance.

  • Scout and gather new attributes, like degree type and major, which differentiate performance.

  • Credit model has potential applications beyond student lending.

Meet the Team

  • Prior to Monogram, Mr. Meyers was Chairman and CEO of Cognition Financial, and co-founded First Marblehead Corporation with Stephen Anbinder.  He began working on asset-backed financing structures in 1986, and from 1980 through 1991, Mr. Meyers was involved in derivatives and arbitrage trading at EF Hutton, Prudential-Bache, LF Rothschild Unterberg Towbin and Commodities Corporation, a hedge fund now owned by Goldman Sachs. His board experience in the education space spans decades, including serving 23 years including four terms as Chair of the Board of the School of Education Foundation at the University of Virginia, the Forum for the Future of Higher Education at The Aspen Institute, and the Education Funding Committee of the Consumer Bankers Association in Washington, D.C. Mr. Meyers received a B.A. in economics from Brandeis University and completed the Owner President Management program at Harvard Business School.

  • Mr. Gelber has significant experience in understanding and navigating capital markets and strategy, previously holding various roles at Cognition Financial, including serving as President and Director from 2013 to 2023. He also served as a Legislative Assistant to Congressman Jack Quinn (N.Y.), primarily focused on education, telecommunication, and banking legislation. Mr. Gelber received a B.A. from The George Washington University.

  • Ms. Patrick most recently served as Vice Chair of Finance at Cognition Financial and brings extensive expertise to Monogram after years of developing and executing strategic initiatives in the industry. In her previous roles, she facilitated various mergers and acquisitions for companies including PennantPark and Apollo Residential Mortgage Inc (NYSE: AMTG). Before joining Apollo, Ms. Patrick held a variety of other leadership roles, including Managing Director at JP Morgan in the Financial Institutions Group, a Senior Managing Director at Bear Stearns with oversight of the Specialty Finance Investment Banking effort, a Vice President at Salomon Smith Barney Citigroup, and a Senior Accountant in the financial services audit practice at Deloitte & Touche. Ms. Patrick holds a BS in Accounting from Pennsylvania State University Scholars Program and an MBA in Finance from Columbia University School of Business. She is a Certified Public Accountant.

  • Before Monogram, Mr. Heneghan served as EVP, Business Development and Product at Cognition Financial. He brings significant experience to Monogram based on his depth of experience within business development, corporate development and product strategy functions. Mr. Heneghan also served as a Legislative Assistant to Congressman Jack Quinn (N.Y.). He received a B.A. from The George Washington University.

  • Previously working for organizations including Lehman Brothers, Sallie Mae and CampusDoor, Mr. Winnie brings deep experience in consumer lending, loan servicing, loan program design, regulatory compliance, intellectual property and technology to Monogram. He has extensive risk management experience and, with more than 20 years of experience working as an attorney, 16 of which were In-House General Counsel, has broad experience in business management, transactional legal work, and information security. He received his J.D. from Cornell Law School.

  • Mr. Kerrigan brings decades of financial and leadership experience to Monogram. Prior to Monogram, Mr. Kerrigan served as EVP, Finance and Chief Financial Officer at Cognition Financial, and also served in a number of leadership roles at Egenera, including both CEO and CFO. Mr. Kerrigan also previously served as the Controller of Diacrin, a publicly traded biotechnology company, and held positions in the audit divisions of Ernst & Young LLP and Price Waterhouse LLP. Mr. Kerrigan has been a Certified Public Accountant in Massachusetts since 1996. He is a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and Massachusetts Society of Public Accounts. He received a B.S. degree in Business Administration from Merrimack College and a Masters in Taxation degree from Northeastern University.

  • Mr. Meyer has extensive experience overseeing finance, product strategy – including loan analytics and portfolio management – and capital markets groups, which allows him to bring unique insights to his role as EVP & Chief Credit Officer. Prior to Monogram, he served in a number of roles at Cognition Financial and also previously worked as a Senior Research Engineer at the Neuromuscular Research Center at Boston University. Mr. Meyer received a M.Eng. in Biomedical Engineering from the College of Applied Sciences, Hamburg and a M.Sc. in Administrative Studies (Innovation & Technology) from Boston University. He is a Certified Business Intelligence Professional (CBIP).

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