Sallie Mae brings 700 jobs to Muncie

MUNCIE - Student loan provider Sallie Mae plans to open a center in the Muncie that would create an estimated 700 jobs over three years, officials said Monday.\n"Today's job announcement is the largest here in 20 years and means that our high school and college graduates can choose a career with a Fortune 500 company right here in Muncie," Muncie Mayor Dan Canan said.\nCanan and Sallie Mae CEO Tim Fitzpatrick on Monday signed a letter of intent allowing the company to lease a 54,000-square-foot building at the Muncie Airpark for 10 years and then buy it, according to a news release from the office of Gov. Mitch Daniels.\nMuncie workers would focus on student loan default prevention, which is performed by subsidiaries in the company's debt management division.\nHiring will begin as early as August, the news release said.\nUp to 300 jobs would be available within the first year, and the company plans to fill 200 jobs in each of the next two years, bringing the total to 700 by 2008.\n"I've been talking to Sallie Mae and am delighted they chose Muncie as a place for this great new investment," Daniels said in a statement. "We showed them several options, and Muncie really stepped up."\nSallie Mae is one of the nation's top student loan providers. The new jobs will bring the company's employment in Indiana to more than 3,000. One of the company's four loan-serving centers is based in Fishers, north of Indianapolis.\nPotential workers would need at least a high school education and communication and analytical skills, the company said.\nSallie Mae primarily provides federal and private student loans, including consolidation loans, for undergraduate and graduate students and their parents. It owns or manages student loans for 8 million borrowers and employs 10,000 at offices nationwide, according to the company's Web site.\nSallie Mae was originally created in 1972 as a government-sponsored entity. The company began privatizing its operations in 1997, a process it completed at the end of 2004, and is listed on both the Fortune 500 and the Forbes 500.