Representative Virginia (Crazy like a) Foxx (R-NC) has no sympathy for people with student loans

[jp11]

23. She has a point

unless you are doing something like going to school to be a doctor there isn't a 'need' to have that much (80k+) student debt. If you do it is because you chose a school WAY outside of your means, went for a masters/phd or expect to make lots of money when you get out. Sadly too many people don't 'do the math' on their tuition or understand what the real world value of their education will be.

People can get an education that leads to a career from cheaper schools, by taking classes at a county college then transferring to a 4 year school in their 2nd/3rd year. County college could be 2-3k a year, state college 5-10k a year, if you went straight to state that's still 'only' 25-40k of debt, make use of county college and you might be closer to 15k. Today there are numerous schools offering courses online that can bring your costs down as well in the situations where county college might not offer enough courses to meet your requirements through your first 2 years. This is one 'good' aspect where colleges are competing for online enrollment sometimes offering instate prices to out of state students that never step foot on their campus.

Going to a state school you won't get to benefit from some snooty alumni giving preference to other alumni cause they think it validates their own choices and makes them feel like they know the quality of your soul cause you both went to the same expensive school. Will it stop you from having a career or getting into the field you want to get into, not at all, but you can't chum it up with other people from the 'big name' schools dropping that name oh so tastefully, if that is what you want feel free to go way into debt for it.

I realize lots of people want to go to big name schools, even better if they have an awesome sports team , but it isn't required to pay so much money for an education which is the point of college/vocational school so you can have a career. Would I have liked to go to one of my 'dream' schools of course I would but I didn't have the money and wasn't willing to take on that kind of debt when I had other options.

To the point tuition at many schools is 'too high' but not all and you don't need to go to the really expensive schools just like you don't need to go out and buy the most expensive car you can find just to get around.