The student lender Sallie Mae, after trying to force colleges in at least three states to provide it with contact information for potential student borrowers, is backing down.

The company, which is the nation's largest student-loan provider, described the shift in strategy after a Washington-based policy group revealed this month that the lender had filed a New York Freedom of Information Law request asking community colleges in the State University of New York system to provide it with student names, telephone numbers, and mailing and e-mail addresses. ...

The company filed its demands for the information late last month, around the time that President Bush signed legislation cutting more than $20-billion from the subsidies provided to lenders in the federally guaranteed student-loan program.

Sallie Mae said it wanted the student contact data to help it make more students aware of all their low-cost loan options. The company has acknowledged, however, that as a result of the federal subsidy cuts, it expects its future profitability to depend more heavily on its ability to write unsubsidized private loans that are marketed directly to students. ...

Sallie Mae's pursuit of the student data was revealed by the New America Foundation, a Washington-based policy group. The lender, after being asked about the report, issued a written statement saying it was acting in the best interest of students. The company said it wanted to make students aware of their ability to obtain federal grant money, and of the maximum amount of federally guaranteed loans, before they accept higher-cost private loans.

The company sent the freedom-of-information requests "to colleges and universities in states where we have seen a significant increase in deceptive marketing practices and misinformation about student loans," it said in the statement.

"If a school decides to willingly share the nonsensitive information, their students will receive information that reinforces the importance of first exhausting free money and federal loan options before turning to private education loans," the company said.

Such data requests are nevertheless discouraged under new ethics guidelines that the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators has been promoting in the aftermath of the student-loan scandals revealed this year. ...