DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Tailgate Forum Placing the Blame as Students are Buried in Debt

This honestly makes me wonder if college is even worth it anymore...also why I only pay for things with straight cash, homie.


http://finance.yahoo.com/college-educati...edu-collegeprep

Placing the Blame as Students Are Buried in Debt
by Ron Lieber
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
provided by


Like many middle-class families, Cortney Munna and her mother began the college selection process with a grim determination. They would do whatever they could to get Cortney into the best possible college, and they maintained a blind faith that the investment would be worth it.

Today, however, Ms. Munna, a 26-year-old graduate of New York University, has nearly $100,000 in student loan debt from her four years in college, and affording the full monthly payments would be a struggle. For much of the time since her 2005 graduation, she's been enrolled in night school, which allows her to defer loan payments.


Cortney Munna (Noah Berger for The New York Times)
More from NYTimes.com:

• Answers on Credit Ratings Long Overdue

• Where to Store Down Payment Money

• Owners Stop Paying Mortgages, Fretting

This is not a long-term solution, because the interest on the loans continues to pile up. So in an eerie echo of the mortgage crisis, tens of thousands of people like Ms. Munna are facing a reckoning. They and their families made borrowing decisions based more on emotion than reason, much as subprime borrowers assumed the value of their houses would always go up.

Meanwhile, universities like N.Y.U. enrolled students without asking many questions about whether they could afford a $50,000 annual tuition bill. Then the colleges introduced the students to lenders who underwrote big loans without any idea of what the students might earn someday — just like the mortgage lenders who didn't ask borrowers to verify their incomes.

[Click here to find an online degree program]

Ms. Munna does not want to walk away from her loans in the same way many mortgage holders are. It would be difficult in any event because federal bankruptcy law makes it nearly impossible to discharge student loan debts. But unless she manages to improve her income quickly, she doesn't have a lot of good options for digging out.

Popular Stories on Yahoo!:

• The Dangers of Using a Debit Card

• Government Help Leaves Some Worse Off

• A Catch-Up Guide to Retirement
More from Yahoo! Finance
It is utterly depressing that there are so many people like her facing decades of payments, limited capacity to buy a home and a debt burden that can repel potential life partners. For starters, it's a shared failure of parenting and loan underwriting.

But perhaps the biggest share lies with colleges and universities because they have the most knowledge of the financial aid process. And I would argue that they had an obligation to counsel students like Ms. Munna, who got in too far over their heads.

How many people are like her? According to the College Board's Trends in Student Aid study, 10 percent of people who graduated in 2007-8 with student loans had borrowed $40,000 or more. The median debt for bachelor's degree recipients who borrowed while attending private, nonprofit colleges was $22,380.

The Project on Student Debt, a research and advocacy organization in Oakland, Calif., used federal data to estimate that 206,000 people graduated from college (including many from for-profit universities) with more than $40,000 in student loan debt in that same period. That's a ninefold increase over the number of people in 1996, using 2008 dollars.

The Family

No one forces borrowers to take out these loans, and Ms. Munna and her mother, Cathryn, have spent the years since her graduation trying to understand where they went wrong. Ms. Munna's father died when she was 13, after a series of illnesses.

She started college at age 17 and borrowed as much money as she could under the federal loan program. To make up the difference between her grants and work study money and the total cost of attending, her mother co-signed two private loans with Sallie Mae totaling about $20,000.

When they applied for a third loan, however, Sallie Mae rejected the application, citing Cathryn's credit history. She had returned to college herself to finish her bachelor's degree and was also borrowing money. N.Y.U. suggested a federal Plus loan for parents, but that would have required immediate payments, something the mother couldn't afford. So before Cortney's junior year, N.Y.U. recommended that she apply for a private student loan on her own with Citibank.

Over the course of the next two years, starting when she was still a teenager, she borrowed about $40,000 from Citibank without thinking much about how she would pay it back. How could her mother have let her run up that debt, and why didn't she try to make her daughter transfer to, say, the best school in the much cheaper state university system in New York? "All I could see was college, and a good college and how proud I was of her," Cathryn said. "All we needed to do was get this education and get the good job. This is the thing that eats away at me, the naïveté on my part."

But Cortney resists the idea that this is a tale of bad parenting. "To me, it would be an uncharitable reading," she said. "My mother has tried her best, and I don't blame her for anything in this."

The Lender

Sallie Mae gets a pass here, in my view. A responsible grownup co-signed for its loans to the Munnas, and the company eventually cut them off.

But what was Citi thinking, handing over $40,000 to an undergraduate who had already amassed debt well into the five figures? This was, in effect, a "no doc" or at least a "low doc" subprime mortgage loan.

A Citi spokesman declined to comment, even though Ms. Munna was willing to sign a waiver giving Citi permission to talk about her loans. Perhaps the bank worried that once it approved one loan, cutting her off would have led her to drop out or transfer and have trouble paying back the loan.

Today, someone like Ms. Munna might not qualify for the $40,000 she borrowed. But as the economy rebounds, there is little doubt that plenty of lenders will step forward to roll the dice on desperate students, especially because the students generally can't get rid of the debt in bankruptcy court.

The University

The financial aid office often has the best picture of what students like Ms. Munna are up abbgainst, because they see their families' financial situation splayed out on the federal financial aid form. So why didn't N.Y.U. tell Ms. Munna that she simply did not belong there once she'd passed, say, $60,000 in total debt?

"Had somebody called me and said, 'Do you have a clue where this is all headed?', it would have been a slap in the face, but a slap in the face that I needed," said Cathryn Munna. "When financial aid told her that they could get her $2,000 more in loans, they should have been saying 'You are in deep doo-doo, little girl.' "

That's not a role that the university wants to take on, though. "I think that would be completely inappropriate," said Randall Deike, the vice president of enrollment management for N.Y.U., who oversees admissions and financial aid. "Some families will do whatever it takes for their son or daughter to be not just at N.Y.U., but any first-choice college. I'm not sure that's always the best decision, but it's one that they really have to make themselves."

The complications here go well beyond the propriety of suggesting that a student enroll elsewhere. Colleges don't always know how much debt its students are taking on, which makes it hard to offer good counsel. (N.Y.U. does appear to have known about all of Ms. Munna's loans, though.)

Then there's a branding problem. Urging students to attend a cheaper college or leave altogether suggests a lack of confidence about the earning potential of alumni. Nobody wants to admit that. And once a university starts encouraging middle-class students to go elsewhere, it must fill its classes with more children of the wealthy and a much smaller number of low-income students to whom it can afford to offer enormous scholarships. That's hardly an ideal outcome either.

Finally, universities exist to enroll students, not turn them away. "Aid administrators want to keep their jobs," said Joan H. Crissman, interim president and chief executive of the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators. "If the administration finds out that you're encouraging students to go to a cheaper school just because you don't think they can handle the debt load, I don't think that's going to mesh very well."

That doesn't change the fact, however, that the financial aid office is still in the best position to see trouble coming and do something to stop it. University officials should take on this obligation, even if they aren't willing to advise students to attend another college.

Instead, they might deputize a gang of M.B.A. candidates or alumni in the financial services industry to offer free financial planning to admitted students and their families. Mr. Deike also noted that the bigger problem here is one of financial literacy. Fine. He and N.Y.U. are in a great position to solve for that by making every financial aid recipient take a financial planning class. The students could even use their families as the case study.

The Options

The balance on Cortney Munna's loans is about $97,000, including all of her federal loans and her private debt from Sallie Mae and Citibank. What are her options for digging out?

Her mother can't help without selling her bed and breakfast, and then she'd have no home. She could take her daughter in, but there aren't good ways for her to earn a living in Alexandria Bay, in upstate New York.

Cortney could move someplace cheaper than her current home city of San Francisco, but she worries about her job prospects, even with her N.Y.U. diploma.

She recently received a raise and now makes $22 an hour working for a photographer. It's the highest salary she's earned since graduating with an interdisciplinary degree in religious and women's studies. After taxes, she takes home about $2,300 a month. Rent runs $750, and the full monthly payments on her student loans would be about $700 if they weren't being deferred, which would not leave a lot left over.

She may finally be earning enough to barely scrape by while still making the payments for the first time since she graduated, at least until interest rates rise and the payments on her loans with variable rates spiral up. And while her job requires her to work nights and weekends sometimes, she probably should find a flexible second job to try to bring in a few extra hundred dollars a month.

Ms. Munna understands this tough love, buck up, buckle-down advice. But she also badly wants to call a do-over on the last decade. "I don't want to spend the rest of my life slaving away to pay for an education I got for four years and would happily give back," she said. "It feels wrong to me."

Correction: An earlier version of this column online misstated the benchmark year in a study by the Project on Student Debt.

So it is the University's fault??? OK OK OK...This is EXACTLY what is wrong with America today. It is always someone elses fault. When is it your OWN fault??? When are we going to take responsibility for our OWN actions??? They might be paying for the consequences but they are not assuming responsibility for the predicament.(accepting consequnces is not the same as accepting responsibility)

Where I agree that the school could have provided that "slap in the face"...most people when provided that slap get indignent and tell the other party to "mind their own business".

I agree that there is some predatory lending going on here. But that does not excuse people from their OWN RESPONSIBILITIES. They said it themselves...all they thought about was the good school and how proud they were of her....WELL...THERE'S THE MISTAKE...MAYBE they should have thought about other things as well.

Everyon is a bit at fault for the position this person is in...BUT no one is at greater fault than the daughter and mother themselves.

Quote:

---

It's the highest salary she's earned since graduating with an interdisciplinary degree in religious and women's studies.

---

OMG.. they put the smoking gun in the next to last paragraph.. seriously, HOW MUCH did she expect to make with this degree?... and living in San Fran.. how'd she get there from NY?

I agree college costs are out of control, I agree that it sounds like a whole bunch of people led this girl and her mom on an emotional joy ride and they could have been giving her better advice but the advice she needed was REAL ADVICE like, "When you graduate with this degree, you'll need to learn how to say, 'Do you want fries with that?'"

I've had this talk with my son, who is 13, several times when the topic of college comes up and where he wants to go and where he CAN go.. and it comes down to this, if you want to go to med school or law school and you can get into a top notch college and incur the debt but are almost guaranteed of having the income to pay it off fine.. but if you want to teach in high school or be a civil engineer then there is NO WAY IN HELL that you need to go to Harvard or Duke or MIT.. you just don't need to go there.

This girl spending that kind of coin to get a non-marketable degree from NYU is the real crime in all of this.

First off, the mother and the daughter are the only ones to be blamed for the debt. Second, I'm not sure which of two is more clueless, the mother allowing her daughter to go that far in debt or the daughter for actually going that deep in debt. And for what, a degree in Religious and Women's studies!!!! Haha. They would have been better off setting $10,000 on fire and cut their losses. I mean did the daughter or mother think a degree in religious and women's studies would actually translate to a career with great income potential? It sounds like a great opportunity was wasted at a terrific university for a worthless degree.

Also, if the daughter is so overly concerned with debt, than living in San Fran probably isn't the wisest choice of places to live at this time.

Same cycle as the housing crisis ...

The banks simply didn't count on jobs drying up. They figured, 'let this idiot rack up $50k trying to get a philosophy degree or whatever, and spend the rest of their working life chipping away at the interest'.

For the last 20-30 years, an increasing portion of our economy has operated under that sort of thinking ... it's the closest thing we've got to indentured servitude anymore.

Folks who buy what they can't afford on credit became a business within itself.

But it takes two to tango ... in the late 90's/early 2000's I was offered all sorts of 'are you serious?' loans from banks, just like everyone else. I said thanks but no thanks.

Quote:

---

that and universities really don't need flatscreen LED-LCD 3-D TVs hanging around everywhere on campus and other luxurious items like that which continue to drive the price up (along with a multitude of other extraneous spending).

---

I do a lot of university work and its insane.. I will tell you that the logic they use is essentially the same logic used in the corporate world..

If you want to keep your university highly ranked...
then you have to recruit top notch professors and to notch students...
if you want to recruit top notch professors and students then you have to have the amenities to compete...

Having those luxuries around to attract the profs and students is no different than having a top notch weight room and practice facility to attract the best athletes.. the only difference is that the profs and students don't generate the same immediate income that the athletes do.

We all know someone who spent four years studying history or English and now they can't get a decent job. Unless you want to teach, what are you gonna do with those degrees?

Not trying to defend her or her mother but I can say for the most part, the advice given to me was just get that degree, doesn't matter in what, and the better school you go to, the better off you'll be. Then to top it off, she leaves college in the worst job market since the great depression it really is ... poor timing. 5 yrs ago, it could be a much different story.

And for the most part, universities are worried about the bottom line and do a ... poor job guiding kids for their career paths. My counselor told me to go to career fair, which was a complete waste of my time. It involved standing in lines to hand in my resume, I got nothing out of it.

Still having a degree is better than not having a degree, but better planning school systems are needed. I think places like Germany have the best system thus far for preparing people for success.

sorry to pile on as the "guidance" system we have in place is usually not worth much or anything in most places.

but, before I went to college, I researched future salaries of prospective jobs. I even researched individual specialties within certain degrees along with current job demand and expected job growth (yes, this changed a ton obviously).

For instance, I found that electrical engineers made the most $$$ out of the engineering disciplines (biomedical was projected to make more and they now do, but at the time, electrical was still in the lead). And, biomedical and electrical were expected to have the most job growth in the next 10 years.

I preferred physics to chemistry, so I chose electrical.

From there, I researched the disciplines and found that analog design engineers made the most $$$ followed by digital design engineers. Electrical system engineers and communication engineers made far less and there was less demand for them when I talked with people in the industry (most being either government contracted or factory employed jobs). So, I focused on both analog and digital design work in college.

I ended up getting 4 internships while I was still in college during the summers and taking 2 semesters off to complete more extensive training during school (1 in systems, 1 in analog, 2 in digital) and I preferred digital design work, so that is the career path that I took.

I ended up having to move away from Ohio to get the work that I wanted, but I was able to make a sound financial decision for myself in high school that is still paying off today.

I used similar reasoning when selecting a school (surprisingly and luckily, because of the scholarships that I was eligible for and the price at the time, Case was actually a little cheaper than Ohio State for me among other schools).

I respect your very logical approach to the whole thing.. I would add though that it is important to select a major and a field that you enjoy and don't just chase the highest salary and the best opportunity. If you wanted to be an engineer and chose this with the thought you would also enjoy it, then good for you.

That is where the trade off comes into play.. if paying for college is going to be a challenge for you and you really want to be a civil engineer, NC States program is better than Dukes at less than half the cost... plus NC State has much better looking girls.

very good point. I should have added at the top that I chose engineering as my base because I thought I would enjoy it more than being a lawyer, nurse, doctor, or other such job. My internships (which I started early) backed up that thought.

and I agree you cannot just chase the highest salary. that's why I didn't go BioMed and why I didn't become an analog designer. I narrowed down my focus based on what I liked best.

as for choosing a school based on what you expect to earn from your degree. Yes, this is definitely something you should consider.

I don't think it's wise to go to an out of state school to incur more debt. I've also been very fortunate that my parents believe a college education comes with the cost of having a child (I, too, believe the same, which is why I will take my sweet time until I'm financially stable).

That said, I hear about what my friends have coming in terms of their debt load and it makes my head spin. How can they buy a house when they're already paying off the cost of a house?

For me, it doesn't make sense for me to move out of my house until I can afford a new car (one that will last me until I'm in my low to mid-30's) and the down payment on a house (without taking out an insurance policy for the down payment aka "a down payment on a down payment").

I just don't understand how my generation is going to get out of the mountains of debt they've incurred before they even have a job.

I wasn't nearly as diligent as you, but I followed a similar decision path. The two things I considered were:

1. Was the subject interesting? I'm the kind of person that can get frustrated when I'm not engaged in something. Those first couple years were brutal getting through the "weed-out" classes, but there were always little nuggets of interesting things to learn.

2. Can I use what I'm learning later? Dad always told me that an engineering degree is the most useful you can get. It teaches you to think, more than anything. I would have to agree, seeing all the different career path my classmates have taken since graduation. Some go into the business side of things, some are doing sales, and some have gone even further away from their education.

Anyways, back on topic... One thing I will say about the financial aid and guidance departments is that, would it really kill them to make it a little easier/more clear for the students and parents? I mean, I did the whole financial aid/student loan/scholarship thing, graduated, and I probably still couldn't properly explain the whole process.

That being said, this woman and her daughter are idiots. Personally, I don't believe in the whole predatory lending argument. I know the lending sharks are shady and everything, but what it comes down to is your signature at the bottom of that document. Signature = Responsibility. The daughter shouldn't have gone to the most (or at least one of) the most expensive colleges in the country.

-jc-

I don't blame anyone but my self for my student loan debt. I was young and naive and believed that with my degree I would be making good money. They would regularly give us pamphlets that showed us that the average graduate with X degree started out with Y salary. After I graduated and I searched for a job I found that It was a bit misleading. I ended up staying at the company I worked for because leaving would have meant an 8k/year pay-cut. My wife was pregnant at the time and I needed to start paying back my loans so I felt doing so would have been stupid.

So I have a degree but I don't work in a field that requires that degree.

I do think that there should be restrictions. There is no way a person who is trying to get a degree that pays ~30k/year be allowed to have 100k in student loan debt. (in reference to the article, this is not my scenario.) If I made $100 a month and tried to get a car loan for a Hummer I would get laughed out of the dealership and there wouldn't be any bank that would give me that loan.

But because student loans are so protected from bankruptcy laws they give loans to people who can not afford them. Yes it is those people fault but these people are usually not educated and in my case I was not aware of how easy you can look up wages/salary on the department of labor and get information for myself. The institutes and lenders are very good at holding a nice carrot in front of students and when you finally get it you discover it is rotten. Again I'm not saying the students are blameless, just uneducated. But there is definitely blame for the institutions and lenders, IMO. I do agree that student loans should be protected, because unlike cars and houses you can't repossess knowledge.

I don't have nearly as bad as others but nearly 1/4 of my pay per month goes to pay student loans. I have however been able to work out a few deals. The degree I earned was and Applied Science Associates in Software Applications and Computer Programming. I have so far programmed and sold two programs on the side. I am working on a third and in agreement to finish it I won't receive a single penny. In turn they will pay off 2 of my 6 loans. If I ranked the loans 1-6 from highest balance to lowest they would be 3 & 4. This would cut my Student loans down $187 a month.

Me and my wife have been working on a debt reduction plan. We targeted our (or should I say her) credit card debt first because 1) the interest is higher and 2) I can claim the student loan interest on my taxes.

In two years I will be down to two student loans (they are the higher ones but they have the lowest interest) and I will be able to afford double payments a month.

If I could go back in time, I would have never gone to college.

Yeah I am lucky to be debt free myself, but most of my friends are not so lucky. Its ridiculous. But thats what has been beaten down our throats since we were little. NEED a good college education and that equals good job and earning potential.

I agree, but it also does too things. One it limits you more, and two for many jobs coming out with that you're either over quailified or dont have the experience. I have been told several times to get a bachelor's degree, get a job and then work towards a master while at that job or after working a few years. Otherwise you back yourself into a tough corner.

depending on your field, that can absolutely be the correct path.

my point was more that many students don't realize that the bachelor's degree is not the final step towards that high paying job anymore.

Like others have mentioned, the mother and daughter are absolute idiots. Going to a prestigious university to get a putrid degree. What kind of 100k jobs are they expecting to get with that degree??

The only reason you would do that is to get some sort of "easier" degree to pave the way for a masters degree/PhD. Even then ... going to an expensive University just to get that is pretty dumb.

And I love how they always say college is too expensive for normal people now. Unless something has drastically changed in only 10 years, that's garbage. I put myself completely through college ... with NO scholarship funding or parental help. I worked a night job, got a few grants, and a few minimal loans. I also went to an affordable university (When I was accepted by several more expensive ones). If I really wanted to save money, I could of lived at home for a few years and gone to a local university. If I had the opportunity, I could of gone to a JC for 2 years and really saved some coin.

Most importantly, I got a degree that was worth the cost and trouble (Comp Sci).

Now I work for a Fortune 500 company, and having been apart of several hiring processes ... I can tell you the name of the college on the resume doesn't matter a whole lot. If people want to consider your GPA, they might take into effect a 2.9 at MIT versus a 4.0 at Iowa State ... but the majority of the interview is going to be based on what you KNOW, how you think through problems, life experience, personality ... and then way, way down on the list ... what college you actually went to.

ya in my experience with those who have taken them, those attaining degrees in womens studies, political science, middle eastern 16th century studies etc generally end up becoming a professor so they can teach a new generation about womens studies, political science, and middle eastern 16th century studies, and they can become professors.

Parents need to be much more involved with their kids in their selection of learning in college because these "fun" degrees may let your college years be awesome and like an episode of Saved By The Bell, but who is going to elect a governor because he or she is 25 and just graduated with a degree in "political science?"

Remember Democrat Darcy Burner who ran for congress? She had a degree from Harvard. She repeatedly said that it was a degree in Economics. Umm ... well .... it was actually Computer Science ... but .. you know ..... that doesn't roll off the tongue quite as easily .....



She also claimed to be a former Micrasoft executive ..... and that wasn't ... well .... true either.


maybe this woman should just claim that her degree is actually a double major in engineering and business administration, with double minors in physics and computer science.

Let's see.

Troubled by costs of tuition, yet still chose a very expensive school, in a place that has a high cost of living. Hmm, maybe they should have started with economics 101 in high school.

With all the schools in the country to go to, does an "elite" college degree really mean that much more than a regular college degree in the typical world? Sure maybe the Harvard, Yale names sound great when running for office, but to the typical corporate employer a degree is a degree if it's a credible school.

There's blame to go around.

$22 an hour? I'd cut off my left nut to make that jack. $750 a month isn't bad, depending on where she's at rent-wise.

The student loans are a big, big issue though, so that nullifies any advantage the good pay might have.

I make far far less than that, and I have a more practical degree.

I felt sorry for her until I found out she was making $22/hr. That's about $41,000 a year.

In my limited experience, I've found that school name matters very little. I went to Case for Biomedical Engineering, and that's one of the best schools in that field (top 5 when I got in and has bounced around within the top 20 ever since). I work in the same field, and I'm surprised how many people haven't even heard about the school (what, with the undergrad and grad program, research, and partnerships with the clinic and UH).

They pretty much just look at the degree I hold, ask about some notable courses I took, and the name of the school is more of an afterthought/extra. I usually receive more questions about work experience (before this job that was internships and co-ops) than school.

Schools neglect to tell you about those little truths when you're working towards your degree.

Although I switched from engineering in HS to journalism and found an affordable college (Kent State) I failed to do my research like NoLogoRequired and research salaries until I was in my major, sometime around sophomore year.

Journalists make $20,000 a year starting out and can go to $40,000 a year after 30 years. So for the most part you're around $14-15 an hour for most of your life.

My problem was that I didn't realize it until too late. Had I researched the salary in 2001, my junior year, I would have found that PR made much much more and it would have employed the same writing skillset that journalists had.

That being said, my current job is flexible and has a lot of perks, so I'm not gonna hate on it too much. But it's embarrassing salary-wise. I know kids who go to Lakeland that make double because they chose dental hygiene or recreational/leisure studies and became activity directors for cities like the Village of Mayfield or nice suburbs.

The hard-won lesson: Research your salaries of your careers before going into them.

I am happy I do not have student loans because I researched the college and found a good journalism school (KSU). But the career itself has no long-term future. At least I can write

Austin, TX

Couple points to make:

1.) The Harvards/MITs/Stanfords are not generally the school getting kids into trouble like this... they tend to have great need based aid, which means kids owe very little at the end of their college careers. I went to Northwestern where I believe they've recently instituted a $20k max on loans over 4 years ($5k/yr). I ended up with a little more than $13k in loans - and due to need based aid, my yearly tuition was actually less than my brother's who went to OSU (in state) during the two years we overlapped. I've heard talk that Harvard is considering free school if your family makes less than $60-$80k.

2.) A bigger danger are the schools in the next tier, who still have inflated $40k/$50k price-tags, but don't have the financial backing (like the Ivy Leagues) to offer great need based aid to low income students. High end liberal arts colleges are especially bad, as they don't have research money coming in to offset losses from student tuition.

3.) While you should definitely put some blame on the student/parent in these situations - we're doing a bad job educating them about "what carrying $100k in debt" really means. The schools certainly aren't going to tell them - and there's a definite push from high schools (which love their kids going to top schools) to tell them to pick the best possible.

I'll probably have more thoughts later

I honestly think we are packing colleges with kids that don't really need to be there. I have changed my opinion on this greatly in the last 20 years.. I used to think you HAD to go to college right away.. I'm leaning away from that more and more these days... a good experienced electrician can make over $100K a year... which is about the same as an electrical design engineer.

Yep, the more I look at it the more I think that college will always be there, and that going out and getting your feet wet and seeing what it is you really want to do with your life for a few years before going to college isn't a bad idea...

Its hard to feel sorry for people with absolutely massive student loan debt. It is so uncessary and there are so many ways around it... You can go to a decent state University and earn a 4 year degree for probably around $35K in tuition. And you can typically do 2 years at a community college like Tri-C or Lakeland and then transfer those credits over to a school like Kent or Akron or CSU and end up paying a lot less than $35K...

You can get scholarships, grants, work-study programs that help pay for tuition in addition to hourly pay, etc.

Its also best to go in to a field that has payoff. Don't get a degree in philosophy or political science. Go for business or nursing or something like that.

If people want to go to an expensive private school or live it up in college with personal expenses or go after a philosophy degree, that is fine... but its only common sense that you may rack up major debt and have no job at the end of it. Its not like suddenly these people wake up and have $100K+ in debt. They make a decision to go to an expensive school, and then wonder what happened after they graduate... Its stupid.

internships!

that's one area I think Kent State did well in its JMC program (journalism and mass comm). Everyone had to have one to graduate. JMC, along with nursing, the Liquid Crystal Institute and architecture are what made KSU great.

I actually went after a career in journalism... I got a degree in History... Never found work. My brother was a reporter until losing his job last year....

I ended up going back to school to get another bachelors degree in accounting and a masters in tax...