Grace Goldmeer
Staff Reporter
To get a job today experience is demanded and college degrees are expected at entry to middle-level positions. For kids leaving high school with big dreams there are only a few options: join the military, go to a trade school, go to college or work entry-level positions and struggle to climb the latter. According to bls.gov, about 70% of students choose to go to college.
With this big decision there is quite a cost, tuition for schools in state can be up to $48,000 per year (collegecalc.org). This can be a lot of pressure on people who barely qualify as adults. Students can have a high grade point average and apply for scholarships endlessly without success as well. The only thing left to do is apply for federal aid, which depends entirely on what situation a student was born into, and to look for student loans. They are a heavy topic and make students feel like they are a disappointment for not getting a dozen scholarships. But in reality loans may be the best option for most families. This poses the question of are student loans exploiting young adults?
Taking out a student loan is taking a risk. The borrower does not know if they will finish college or if the degree they are seeking will get them the position they want with the pay they want. But with that risk comes reward. As a student goes through college and they begin paying off the loan they build a credit score and grant access to other useful tools necessary for adult life. However, universities do not make it easy for students to not struggle financially when tuition alone has “grown eight times faster than wages” when adjusted for inflation since 1989 and makes the average loan repayable in twenty-one years (theepochtimes.com). The school system and the government encourage eighteen-year-olds to find their passion through schools but make it possible only through massive financial debt that these kids will be paying off into their forties.
Student loans can be necessary but are a huge decision to make that will affect a large portion of a student's life. The “best years” of an adolescent's life should not be spent under crippling anxiety over money. At the end of the day though, student loans are not impossible, and with a realistic outlook, a plan, the right motivation, and persistence they can be paid off- benefiting both credit score and pride.
Image Credit: Martin Péchy on Unsplash
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