WSJ.com: "Students are borrowing dramatically more to pay for college, accelerating a trend that has wide-ranging implications for a generation of young people.
New numbers from the U.S. Education Department show that federal student-loan disbursements—the total amount borrowed by students and received by schools—in the 2008-09 academic year grew about 25% over the previous year, to $75.1 billion. The amount of money students borrow has long been on the rise. But last year far surpassed past increases, which ranged from as low as 1.7% in the 1998-99 school year to almost 17% in 1994-95, according to figures used in President Barack Obama's proposed 2010 budget."
6 comments:
This is a very interesting article that comes at an important time in my life as a student. Loans are a very real part of my life, and with each passing semester I am increasingly aware of the ridiculous amount of debt that I am in. Being a fairly optimistic person I have some confidence that I will be able to pay it off, but at the same time, hearing about other people pushing back major adulthood "milestones" just because of student loans is really an eye opener. This article brings up an interesting point about how in most situations, schools are not helping the matter and keep raising prices, leading to an increasingly severe cycle of debt. Yikes.
It seems a bit discouraging to come out with so much debt. I know that several people here might be in debt much more than 23K by the time they leave here. Luckily, some of the leading economists say that things have reached rock bottom and cannot get any worse if we are to continue just living because a slower rate of production is unlikely.
This is very accurate. My family and I have been very conscious about how we borrow and get money for school as to not accumulate debt for either me or my parents. While money is something we have to be mindful while starting and continuing through college, I definitely would prefer to make life choices based on what I want to do and accomplish that what my debt has grown to be over four years. Hopefully the strategy will continue to work now that this economy is not so healthy.
I really do hope, though, that all this education reform that Obama kept talking about during his campaign gets worked on. It really would be nice to see reform in college tuition costs--at the LEAST for state funded schools, even though we'd still be screwed going to CMU. It's really sad to know people who can't go to a "good" school, and who have the grades to get in, but just can't afford it.
As a student, I am not eager to walk out of college with a lot of debt. It will bog me down for years to come. At the same time, the fact that kids are being forced to take responsibility for their education may have some good implications. I have met a lot of kids at cmu paying different amounts of money for their education. I met 2 people who are here on full rides and both have already skipped a class, in the first 2 weeks. Kids like me, who are paying the full cost, I think are less likely to skip class because they know the burden their education is putting on their wallets.
This may not be the worst thing if it helps kids take education more seriously.
Oh, college debt, how much fun you will be in three short years. It's so sad the amount of debt we will all collect while at CMU preparing to go into the arts where we will make very little money. I like Andrew, hope Obama's plan goes into action, even if it doesn't help me personally at a private university!
We are getting to a point where a Bachelor's degree doesn't mean as much as it did 20 years ago. Suddenly everyone has Bachelor's degrees and the newest thing is to get a Masters--that is in other industries. What I find interesting is that in film for example, no one cares if you have a degree or not as long as you can do your job well. In theatre, it is a little different, most scenic designers I know have BFA degrees if not MFA. Regional theatres discriminate against designers without union cards and/or degrees. This is at least in my experience.
Post a Comment