The desire for a college education has become a dream rather than a realistic goal for many American students. As parents and students realize that an affordable college education may be out of their personal reach, many look to loans as a possible alternative. Unfortunately, as families are learning, the disheartening reality is that loans may also be too expensive, making them an unfavorable or unobtainable option.
As a student, I have struggled with the expense of college and the seemingly dreadful loan process. I was fortunate enough to find a reasonable loan, with my father as a co-signer, from a nonprofit organization. My younger sister, who graduated from high school just one year after me, was not so fortunate. She applied for a loan from the same nonprofit organization but was denied because my father could not co-sign for both of us. With no credit of her own, she searched for months before she was forced to borrow from a private bank. The interest rate on her loan was monstrous, at more than 10 percent, compared with the 7.2 percent interest I was paying. The outrageousness did not end there; she was also required to pay an additional 3 percent in loan fees.
After my sister received her first bank statement, she decided that it was unrealistic to assume she could afford such a loan. Following her first semester at a state university in Rhode Island, she made the difficult decision to transfer to a local community college. Although my sister had settled into her new environment, made new friends, and excelled in her classes, she was forced to change the college path that she had been planning all throughout high school. Adding salt to the wound was the fact that she would still have to pay back nearly $20,000 for just one semester at that school.
Ultimately, the scarce access to affordable loans caused my sister to move back home and sacrifice the “college experience.” She is currently working extremely hard to get into a radiology program at her community college that only accepts 30 students each year due to the lack of resources needed to properly educate a higher number of students. Is this really what the American dream of a college education should look like?
My sister is a driven young woman who has always excelled in school, and yet she is struggling to continue with an education solely because of affordability. Her case is certainly not an isolated one. Thousands of students across America are struggling with how to pay for the increasing cost of college after discovering the worrisome high cost of loans. If Americans want to be able to compete on an international level, it is clear that student loan reform is necessary.
The Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act (SAFRA) is a bill that could make college more accessible to thousands of students by making all student loans direct loans. With no more unnecessary loan fees and a likely interest rate of 6.8 percent, far below that of my sister’s private bank loan, roughly $67 billion will be saved each year. These savings would go to increase Pell grants, making loans less necessary for some students; funds would also be given to community colleges to provide the necessary resources for the influx of students they have seen recently — something that could really help my sister.
The bottom line is that there is a real student loan crisis in America. Hardworking, intelligent young people, like my sister, are not able to take of advantage of opportunities they should have as Americans. The education of younger generations is the key to the future of this country. When affordable student loans become less accessible and college becomes more expensive, the future of America becomes bleaker.
Courtney Ross, a junior at Roger Williams University, is currently serving as a fellow with AAUW in Washington, D.C.
sorry Stefan, but not everyone’s education was handed to them on a silver platter by their relatives. my parents worked their asses off to pay for their own education 40 years ago, and my siblings and I are now doing the same. money doesn’t grow on trees, whether you’re investing beforehand, or paying back afterward.
it is views like this that perpetuate the problem – a college education is becoming increasingly out of reach for the lower class, thus farther spreading the gap between the classes.
i went to a fairly low-priced state university, and now work at a similar one. i can tell you honestly that the tuition is raised because of ridiculously inflated salaries and poor departmental budgeting. our university is throwing money around left and right for no reason, and instead of cracking down on those responsible, they raised the student fees last year to almost double the previous amount. rob the poor to feed the inept, irresponsible rich.
between university administration and lending companies, everybody is equally greedy and irresponsible.
Why are the banks so strict when it comes to paying loans? When one is borrowing the loan he/she knows how he is going to repay it. After the entire bank once it agrees to give out loan don’t see why they should be harsh when claiming it!
Hey Stefan,
your parents paid half your tuition. I don’t care if they had to scrim and save, you having those parents is an advantage many of us don’t have and ultimately that was a handout. Period.
In Response:
Now that more and more K-12 schools are losing funding and shutting down, is it safe to assume there will be less high school graduates, thus less students going to college in the future?
With this in mind, colleges are going to shrink in attendance, which means one of two things will happen:
1. College tuition will increase as attendance decreases to subsidize their continuing growing costs.
2. College tuition will shrink as colleges tighten budgets, cut out excess spending and fight to attract more students with lower tuition.
I think the possibility for going to college is still very strong in this country. There are problems I see that you haven’t addressed:
1. How much did your parents save to pay for you and your sister’s tuition? My parents are blue collar, without college educations and worked very hard to save for mine and my brother’s tuition. By the time we went off to college, Mom and Dad had saved enough to pay for half our tuition at a very expensive school. These days, it seems people are living way beyond their means and surviving pay check to pay check instead of thinking about the future.
2. How well did you perform in high school? My brother and I went to a private liberal arts college and tuition over the 6 years the two of us were there went from $26K/yr – $32K/yr. Him and I worked very hard in high school for good grades and as a result the college gave us money to attend.
3. How much money did you and your sister make yourselves to pay for your tuition? My brother and I both had jobs in high school and saved for our tuition. Not only did we work through high school to pay for our high education, but we had part-time jobs on campus to help cut costs and in the summer we worked very hard full time to help pay for tuition. One summer, I worked 3 jobs at a total of 72 hours a week so I could have enough money to pay for my senior year.
Now, this doesn’t mean we didn’t have loans. My brother, who graduated high school with honors, received much more money in grants from our college than I did. He managed to graduate with about $10K of student loan debt out of the $120K tuition. I on the other walked away with $17.5K in student loan debt out of my $104K tuition. My parents told us at 13 years old that they would pay for half of our tuition. The rest was up to us to come up with. We both effectively paid for half our tuition out of our own pockets with some minor student loans to help us out.
My point is this: Students loans should be your last resort for paying for college. Your parents had 18+ years to plan for you and your sister’s tuition costs. If they didn’t save for you, that’s their fault. If you graduated with mediocre high school grades and can’t get scholarships or grants, I don’t think you should deserve to live the “college dream” or get the “college experience” because you didn’t strive for a good education before getting to college. Last, if you and your sister didn’t save yourselves, shame on you. This isn’t a country of hand outs, it’s a country built on hard work. It’s not called Mediocre Education, it’s called Higher Education. It’s for the elite who strive for greatness.
Now, maybe you and your family did everything I just described. You didn’t explain at all the work you did in your little article so I can only guess and throw these things out there. Although, your article really reads as if a young person with a sense of entitlement to higher education is complaining about borrowing money. Let me be very clear. You are not entitled to Higher Education. You have to earn it. If this is not the case and you and your family did everything they could before seeking out student loans, then I will insert my foot into my mouth.
I’m sorry for your sister’s tuition troubles.