The media are buzzing with last-minute news on the fate of President Obama’s healthcare reform plan, which is scheduled to come to a vote in the House of Representatives this afternoon. But it’s also crunch time for SAFRA, the massive financial aid overhaul that’s been bundled with that bill. Here’s what’s going on:

The House’s vote on the SAFRA/HCR package is expected early this evening, after a day of procedural preparations. Most observers expect the margin of that vote to be razor-close, but they expect the bill to pass. This is because the Democratic leadership is believed to have a small reserve of potential “yes” votes available — members of Congress who would take a big political hit for voting in favor, but who would be willing to do so if their “no” votes meant the bill’s failure.

It’s possible that there will be some last-minute jockeying over the language of the House bill, though that prospect is growing increasingly unlikely. SAFRA is almost guaranteed not to be a factor today — student aid reform is quite popular in the House, but it’s a less politically charged issue than HCR, so there’s no mileage to be gained from tinkering with it in either direction.

The SAFRA language that the House will be voting on today was released on Thursday. It’s been scaled-back considerably since the summer — of the original $80 billion in savings in the bill, all of which was touted as going to increased aid to education and students, only about $42 billion remains.

But that $42 billion includes tens of billions in new funding for Pell Grants, which have seen a steep increase in applicants since the start of the current recession. It also includes new funding for community colleges — money that at one point in negotiations was stripped from the bill — and a new measure capping student loan payments under the Income-Based Repayment Program at ten percent of a borrower’s total income.

If the SAFRA/HCR package passes the House today, it heads back to the Senate for a reconciliation vote — a vote to “reconcile” the Senate’s language with the House’s. That vote, US Student Association president Gregory Cendana told me yesterday, is scheduled to take place by the end of this week.

The Senate leadership has shown House Democrats a letter in which more than fifty Senators pledge to support the reconciliation bill, and that bill is widely expected to pass with little trouble. But it’s still possible that changes could be made, and if SAFRA is weakened before passage, it’ll happen in the Senate, not the House.

The national news media have been focusing all their attention on the House stage of this process in recent days, and as more information about SAFRA’s Senate prospects becomes available I’ll pass it along. But that’s a thumbnail sketch of what to look for — HCR drama in the House today, last-minute SAFRA lobbying in the Senate for the rest of the week.