Financial Burdens Among College Students Going to college and trying to afford it can be a financially draining experience, and as a student, I know this from experience. It is a universal fact that college is not a cheap investment, and acquiring aid to help with the cost can be hard to come by. Affordibility is the difference bewtween obtaining a degree or not. Due to the recent drop in the economy, it is almost necessary to have a college degree to get a job. Most financial stress occurs when a college financial aid office says they’ll cover a certain amount of the bill, but fail to come through, leaving the student with a large remaining balance and no way to clear it. Not all students experience financial stress. The students fortunate …show more content…
Full-time students working more than 20 hours per week face the greatest financial stress: Three in five said their job interfered with their academic performance, yet just as many had considered working more hours. Steve Chaouki, executive vice president and the head of TransUnion’s financial services business unit, says that being a full-time student means you're less likely to be able to hold a job and have access to credit. So if a student is unable to take out private loans after exhauasting federal loans, what's another option? Some states have now been using merit based aid to support higher education. But, there is not much known of the affect these programs have on students. The HOPE Scholarship provides students entering with support in the form of full tuition, fees and book vouchers. This brings a problem for some students, because the scholarship is only awarded to students who have and maintain a GPA of 3.0 or higher. Research suggests that students who lose their HOPE Scholarship, or are not awarded one, are more financially vlulnerable. Despite public demand, very little has been done to lower studen loan debt. Many cartoons have depicted the very real problem of studen loan debt (see Fig. 1). Despite high financial burden, some groups have argued against lowering student loans. "Senate Republicans on Tuesday blocked consideration of a Democratic bill to prevent the doubling of some student loan interest rates, leaving the legislation in limbo less than two months before rates on subsidized federal loans are set to shoot upward"
In recent years, there has been a tremendous increase in student enrollment in higher education after high school effecting the need for financial aid for all students. Education has become a growing part in America where more students want to better their lives with a college education. However, the cost of college tuition has increased and more students find themselves struggling to pay off the enormous tuition rates. In a recent study by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, student debt has reached $1 trillion in federal loan debt. Student loan debt has crippled the economy and students are struggling to pay off federal loans. In order to help students with the high tuition rates of college the government and universities offer
Is college worth all the stress of paying for it? People spend thousands of dollars with multiple jobs or student loans trying to pay for it. Alana Semuels wrote an article called “Manual Labor, All Night Long: The Reality of Paying for College”, stating the stories of young students who are working hard to be all that they can be. College is stressful and working a job at the same times makes it that much more stressful.
Mark Kantrowitz indicates in his article, Why the Student Loan Crisis Is Even Worse Than People Think, that “Student loan debt is increasing because government grants and support for postsecondary education have failed to keep pace with increases in college costs”(Why 1). This means that the government no longer covers for college tuition fees. College graduates are 20% more likely to work at a job that is outside of their major by the debt they are in. Kantrowitz also mentions that “students who borrow to attend college, it appears that more than a quarter (27.2%) of them are graduating with excessive debt” (Why 1). In reality, leads to student saying that the financial cost was worthless, ending up with a job that is especially not what they went to school
Today in America, “The average Class of 2016 graduate has $37,172 in student loan debt, up six percent from last year. $1.28 trillion in total U.S. student loan debt...44.2 million Americans with student loan debt”(U.S. Student Loan Hero, 1). We spend our lives working, learning, and trying to survive. In order to survive, we need to be educated. In order to be educated, we need money. To collect money, we need a good paying job. And in order to have a job, we need to be educated. It’s a large cycle that goes around in circles, and we can’t seem to find a steady way to help provide these things for everyone. While we all strive to make the best of every situation, money has become an issue, creating problems in many lives around the world. “According to the College Board, the average cost of tuition and fees for the 2016–2017 school year was $33,480 at private colleges, $9,650 for state residents at public colleges, and $24,930 for out-of-state residents attending public universities” (COLLEGEdata, 1). And it’s not easy to have a positive look on the American dream when our own president in spouting things like “Sadly, the American Dream is dead” (President Donald
To being with, college students today are economic pressure by school system and because of that student have become enslaved by financial aid department. This is an excellent quote by Zinsser he states: “they are the authentic voices of a generation that is panicky to succeed” (Zinsser 449). Student are spending more money than the actual value of their degree, on average student are spending 20-30 thousand each year just for tuition. Recently
and tuition plays a major role in students’ decision for attending college. Students according to a 2008 national survey of roughly 1800 students who qualified to attend college 1000 students of those 1800 did not attend college at all. The main reason claimed by 80 percent of the “non-college-goers” was due to lack of money, more especially not enough grant aid. Although a student was well qualified to attend college having no financial aid made their choice to attend impossible. On the other hand, students who couldn’t receive enough grant aid sought other alternatives to go into college like getting loans. Depending on the amount of years one chooses to attend college it can rack up to an unbelievable amount. According to Edvisors, a financial aid website, “The class of 2015 graduated with $35,051 in student debt on average.” Imagine that! It’s no wonder that the students who didn’t receive enough grant aid chose not to attend college. It was because they did not want to accumulate a debt that in most cases they would have to pay throughout their lives, claiming that tuition cost is too much for
Steve Cohen shows the disparity between the rising cost of college and a family’s capability to afford it. Cohen explains “Tuition has risen almost 1,200 percent in the last 35 years, and the sticker price for many four-year private colleges and out-of-state public universities exceeds $250,000.” Moreover, he goes on to say that even at public universities, it is about $80,000 for four years for tuition and other college related expenses. Later in his article, Cohen explains how this leaves middle-class families in a very uncomfortable situation. The parents or other money-making entities in the household want their student to go to college and earn a degree, but now there can be an element of stress in figuring out how the fees will be paid for. Furth...
Children of the twenty first century spend nearly 13 years in school, preparing for what is college, one of the only ways to achieve the so-called “American Dream”. College is the best way to start an advanced career and go further than one possibly could if college degrees were not available, allowing people to achieve their view of the American Dream; whether it be large houses, shiny cars, multiple kids, or financial comfort, college is the stepping stone to achieve the American Dream. But all great things come with a price, college dragging along debt. Students who attend college struggle to find ways to pay for it, leading to applying for student loans. These loans a great short term, paying for the schooling at the moment but eventually the money adds up
Having the college experience is everyone’s dream, especially High School students who are ready to get out into the world and explore. College is very important for furthering someone’s career, but no one thinks about all the costs and the stress that comes along with college. Tuition fees and costs are increasing more and more each year. Now days it feels like you have to be a millionaire just to attend a good college and get a good degree in what you were attending for. There are some students that do not have a lot of money and live on very little things with their parents, but indeed are very smart and have a 4.0 GPA. Those students are the ones that are unable to attend college if they cannot afford it. College tuition is too expensive,
There are so many students who would extremely grateful to attend any four year institution but can’t because of the lack of funds. College life can be very stressful, and the process can is very frustrating to most students the first two years. When the cost of college tuition is compared to the 21 century financial economy the cost does not make sense, because for a middle-class family it is impossible to afford sending their child to any four-year institution. It hard for students to graduate with the stress to pay-off hundreds and thousands of dollars in loans. Going to college is stressful enough without the need to worry about how we’re going to pay for it and what other costs will continue to rise with getting a degree afterwards. With the current increase of unemployment rate and the thought of going to college seems like a farfetched goal. Many people choice not to attend a four year institution, because they did receive a scholarship or enough government funding. Having a college background is very important for professional growth, it will eventually limit career opportunities. My stand point is, you may not leave college doing the same thing you began with but the life experience is endless. College experience not only gives knowledge that builds you into a better person by giving a broader erosion. With the cost of tuition increasing will hurt our generation, by causing physical and mental stress but in the end it will all pay off. Not all colleges are for the blame; some of the blame is our economy and other factors play a big roll. As students we need to be aware of all our resources offered, such as Pell Grants, and government scholarships. For example, the some states will pay for a student’s college if they graduate high school with a GPA of 3.5 or higher. There are many states that are willing to pay for all or some of college tuition only if students are willing to use
Increasing college costs has proven to be a major issue for those who pursue higher learning. With institutions raising tuition and fees, students are forced to make life-altering sacrifices to repay soaring student loans. We have come to a pivotal place in history, where individuals have no choice but to minimize or delay important life decision’s such as moving home with their parents to save money, becoming home owners, retirement saving and forfeiting higher education. The impact of increasing college costs has become so severe that it is at the forefront of politicians, political agenda, inducing conversation and policies like the revised income-driven repayment program. The program proposed to help combat the effects of massive student loans.
With the ever-increasing tuition and ever-tighten federal student aid, the number of students relying on student loan to fund a college education hits a historical peak. According to a survey conducted by an independent and nonprofit organization, two-thirds of college seniors graduated with loans in 2010, and each of them carried an average of $25,250 in debt. (Reed et. al., par. 2). My research question will focus on the profound effect of education debt on American college graduates’ lives, and my thesis statement will concentrate on the view that the education policymakers should improve financial aid programs and minimize the risks and adverse consequences of student loan borrowing.
Since, college students tend to have a lot on their hands with balancing finals, family, and working; might be too much to handle. It can build up stress which can also build up anxiety. Students in poverty can relate to the stress because the affordability of college can put pressure onto themselves and family members trying to save extra cash so their children can earn a degree and a better education that they wish they had in their young adult life.
Going to college will be the best time of people’s lives, but getting into college just might be the worst. These topics being discussed are good to talk about for upcoming college kids to help them get through this troubling time and inform them that they have options. Getting into college is so difficult due to the high costs of tuition, selectiveness of the college, and also just finding the best fit college for incoming freshmen.
Fees and loans are too big of a load for young people to carry. A lot of students drop out do to the pressure of having to worry about all the loans they have to pay back after they are done with college. This should not be an issue to the student. According Iatham Emmmons, “Even worse, a large portion of students never receive funding at all due to the multitude of stipulations that must be adhered to in order to qualify for assistance. A major flaw in the current federal educational assistance programs is that the students’ parents’ income is used to calculate financial need” (Emmons 3). Even citizens who try to get help by applying for funding never end up getting it because they do not meet the needs required for the funding. Education should be p...