Five Things College Students Should Worry About Next Fall

[xchrom]

http://www.alternet.org/education/five-things-college-students-should-worry-about-next-fall



***SNIP


1) Double Trouble
If Congress doesn’t step in, interest rates on subsidized federal Stafford loans are set to double on July 1 st, from 3.4 to 6.8 percent. Student borrowers narrowly averted the hike in 2012; if it goes through this year, it could add up to $5,000 to students’ loan costs over the course of repayment. (Campus Progress is pushing for student loan refinancing, one way to fix hefty interest rates.)

2) Austere Budgets Put the Squeeze on Students
For higher education, the political winds are stormy as Washington grapples with a conservative movement that doesn’t believe college—or maybe anything—should be a shared expense, funded together by taxpayers through federal and state governments. They would rather let you sink or swim on your own.

Recent highlights: 2012 vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan’s much-heralded budget plan would whittle away the value of Pell Grants to low-income students; all 45 Senate Republicans recently voted against easing student loan payment terms and distributing billions of dollars to American colleges; and last month, an Oklahoma lawmaker claimed “it is not our job to see that anyone gets an education” and advocated cutting Oklahoma Promise, a state scholarship program for low-income students.

3) The Sequester
While those threats to college funding have been stymied for now, the austerity-lovers can claim at least one success. The across-the-board federal budget cuts known as the sequester took a bite out of programs students care about, including $86 million for work-study jobs, new fees for student loans, and cuts to scientific research funds for universities.

[marmar]

1. k/r

[hobbit709]

2. Their biggest worry should be getting a job with that degree better than "You want fries with that?"

That's about what most degrees get you now.

[Mnemosyne]

3. My daughter, $10 an hour managing all aspects of a rural free clinic, $27,000 in debt. School

convinced her she would start out making approx. 25-35,000 per year.

Apparently forgiveness for working in deficit areas only applies to doctors and nurses. She works so hard for almost nothing and she still has to fight tooth and nail to get patients the care they need.

Now I'm almost broke from helping her and the kids just with basic survival, and with little hope for higher pay, she won't be able to help me when I need it in the near future.