Education Department officials heard pleas on Friday from people at Texas Christian University that regulations to carry out the newly enacted Higher Education Act not impose costly new burdens on colleges or make it harder for students to pursue their degrees, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reported today.

The hearing was the first in a series, to be held around the country through October, in which department officials are soliciting input on how to fashion rules following passage this summer of the first renewal of the Higher Education Act in a decade.

During Friday’s hearing, Texas Christian’s chancellor, Victor J. Boschini Jr., spoke of colleges’ worry that the legislation will “add enormously” to their costs, the Star-Telegram reported. “The burden of the new reporting requirements alone is mind-boggling,” he said.

Michael H. Scott, the university’s student-aid director, said the new law’s restrictions on preferred-lender lists could make it much harder for financial-aid offices to protect students from making “costly mistakes” as they take out loans.

Catherine L. Coghlan, assistant director of institutional research, said the law’s requirements on textbook prices could have the perverse effect of driving students to pick courses based on book costs, or of forcing professors to use books not of their choosing.

And four graduate students and an instructor in speech pathology urged the adoption of loan forgiveness for people in the field who work in the public schools.

The process of drafting regulations is likely to continue into the next presidential administration, and the Education Department officials are free to accept or ignore the advice they receive at these hearings. —Andrew Mytelka