$2 million spent by PHEAA on giveaways

Jan Murphy of the Patriot News exposes more PHEAA expenses - including "giveaways" such as golf balls, LL Bean Jackets, and T-Shirts bearing the PHEAA logo, I-Pods and DVD players, and candy (including Gummy Brains, which look disgusting). Rep. Josh Shapiro gets the punch line:

“Gummy brains?” Shapiro asked. “The officials at PHEAA must have gummy brains if they were willing to waste scholarship money on these types of wasteful expenditures.”

Sean Logan half-heartedly defends PHEAA,

Sen. Sean Logan, D-Allegheny County, PHEAA’s board vice chairman, said in a recent interview that there’s a big difference between PHEAA and other state agencies.

“There’s one turnpike, one place to get a driver’s license, one Department of Welfare, but there isn’t just one place to get a student loan,” Logan said. “PHEAA has to compete with some of the largest for-profit corporations, so some of that stuff needs to be done.”

...

“We engaged in marketing activities to grow our business outside of Pennsylvania ... and we also had to engage in marketing activity to retain our market that our competitors were trying to take away in Pennsylvania,” he said.

Which raises the obvious question: Why is PHEAA a government agency?