Student debt

[Aspiring Humanist]

I'll be going to university/college next fall, and I'm really having a tough time deciding what I should do. I have my eyes on University of Vermont, University of Oregon and some other ones. The problem is the tuition of those colleges for out of state students is outrageous...compounded with textbooks and room and board and what not I'll be looking at a LOT of debt by the time I graduate. The other option is to go to public university in my state which is a fraction of the cost, but its not a good school. I plan on majoring in a language and minoring in some area studies (not sure which language/region yet), so it probably doesn't matter too much where I go. My question is, should I go to a good school and get raped by student debt or go to a in-state school and not be tied down by debt? Or should I say fuck it and declare bankruptcy when I graduate? (planning on traveling for quite a while after college, credit rating probably not going to affect it) Yeah yeah I know its not particularity revolutionary to be concerned about credit rating but help me out here

Thanks

[Le Libérer]

Even if you declare bankrupcy after you complete your schooling, you will still have to pay back student loans. Like taxes, they are with you until you die, or if a student loan isnt paid back in 25 years, they will forgive part of it.

Just go to the school you want, use the money just for school. It pays off in the end.

[AnonymousOne]

I'll be going to university/college next fall, and I'm really having a tough time deciding what I should do. I have my eyes on University of Vermont, University of Oregon and some other ones. The problem is the tuition of those colleges for out of state students is outrageous...compounded with textbooks and room and board and what not I'll be looking at a LOT of debt by the time I graduate. The other option is to go to public university in my state which is a fraction of the cost, but its not a good school. I plan on majoring in a language and minoring in some area studies (not sure which language/region yet), so it probably doesn't matter too much where I go. My question is, should I go to a good school and get raped by student debt or go to a in-state school and not be tied down by debt? Or should I say fuck it and declare bankruptcy when I graduate? (planning on traveling for quite a while after college, credit rating probably not going to affect it) Yeah yeah I know its not particularity revolutionary to be concerned about credit rating but help me out here

Thanks

Don't do it. Unless you want to be a doctor (if you want to do nursing go to a community college), lawyer, or professional acadmeic, it's not worth going to a university and getting destroyed by debt. Much better and easier to go to a community college. If you can go to a decent enough public school though and not have to deal with student debt, then good for you and I'd say go but only if you won't have any debt.

You can also mix and match, for example 2 years at a comm. college then doing your major/minor work at a public university will seriously reduce costs by a lot.

Basically find something that gets you what you're looking for in your education, while also minimizing debt. If it's really important for you to go to Vermont or Oregon, then go there for four years.

Also, student loan obligations are non-bankruptable. You're still liable for them no matter what (barring disability/death).

[Jose Gracchus]

Student loans are the new serfdom, the bank, your lord.

[Principia Ethica]

If you do go the loan route. . .just be brutally honest if you can't pay. Don't avoid the US Dept of Education, their letters, or their calls. They will defer your payments or lessen the amount per month if you explain your situation. They aren't too happy if they think you are avoiding them. You can't pay if you don't have a job or have a meager income. Throw in some catastrophic life events for good measure and get them to knock down the payments to like $50 a month.

[Ingraham Effingham]

All for invisible credits and a piece of paper at the end, and to listen to self-important fossils read books to you, that you can get at the library.

If a buck can be made, why not?

[Hivemind]

I'm starting university this September and I was thinking about my future debts as well. My original plan was to fake my death and flee the country but then I realized that if I am "dead", then the diploma will become invalid. But then again it's a piece of paper that says that you know something about something.

I'm only going to university to further my knowledge, and my parents and even some of my friends cannot stand that. "Why don't you want a career?" always pops up, to which I always reply "because I don't want to do god knows what for 40 years."

One thing you could do, if available to the program that you want, is co-op. I'm going to do it. It makes university last an extra year, but you pretty much pay off most, if not all your tuition fees so that you finish with no debt. It'd be something to look into, but not many programs or even universities offer that.

[Summerspeaker]

I've been surviving on students loans for a while now. I figure I'll either get a decent job and pay them back, overthrow the financial system and institute communism, drop out of the official economy and live a collective somewhere, or just kill myself and laugh all the way to the grave.

[Decolonize The Left]

I'll be going to university/college next fall, and I'm really having a tough time deciding what I should do. I have my eyes on University of Vermont, University of Oregon and some other ones. The problem is the tuition of those colleges for out of state students is outrageous...compounded with textbooks and room and board and what not I'll be looking at a LOT of debt by the time I graduate. The other option is to go to public university in my state which is a fraction of the cost, but its not a good school. I plan on majoring in a language and minoring in some area studies (not sure which language/region yet), so it probably doesn't matter too much where I go. My question is, should I go to a good school and get raped by student debt or go to a in-state school and not be tied down by debt? Or should I say fuck it and declare bankruptcy when I graduate? (planning on traveling for quite a while after college, credit rating probably not going to affect it) Yeah yeah I know its not particularity revolutionary to be concerned about credit rating but help me out here

Thanks

As CotR noted, declaring bankruptcy is not a solution.

I went to college and graduated with ~24,000 in student loans, lived with my parents and worked 2 jobs for a year and half and paid them all off. You just gotta be serious about your shit.
If you really want to go to an actual university/college, you're going to have to take on loans.

The first step is to beg, plead, do whatever it takes to get as much non-loan student financial aid as possible. Grants, scholarships, etc... get them. As many of them as you can. Are you 1/8th X nationality? There's probably a scholarship out there for you. Do your research and get it. Why? It's free money. Free money is good.
The college/uni will not want to give you grants. Beg them. Argue that your presence at their school is vitally important to their student body for reasons X, Y, and Z. Do whatever it takes to get the free money.

The second step is to understand that after you've done all you can, you're still gonna have to have loans. Study the loan types. Get a fixed interest loan which has a nice, long, grace period. You want at least 6 months grace period (the time after you stop going to school that there's no interest on your loans). Some loans have 9 month grace periods. This is time you will need to save, save, save, to pay off the loans when the grace period kicks in.

The third step is to understand that you do not want to pay the loan off over time. You want to pay the loan off as quickly as possible. The more you pay on principle, the more your monthly payments go to the principle, not the interest. The less you pay on principle, the more money you pay on interest. Paying money on interest is basically shitting money down the drain.
So the more money you can save during your time at school, the better. Work what jobs you have to, cut costs where you have to, do what's needed. Then when the grace period is about to end on your loans, dump all your money onto the principle and keep working.

Loans are a ***** to pay off but they can be done. If you don't want to go through this, then I suggest you take AnonOne's advice and go the community college route instead. Work part-time while you're at school and save that way.

- August

[praxis1966]

Loans are a ***** to pay off but they can be done.

This post constitutes a verbal warning for discriminatory language.

[Fulanito de Tal]

Here's the trick. Go to a school in your state, don't waste as much money, get outstanding grades, and good references. Then, you can get into a better graduate school which counts more than undergrad because a 3.9 from Booger State University looks better than a 2.9 from Harvard. If you don't follow my advice, you'll remember this post for life.

[bcbm]

This post constitutes a verbal warning for discriminatory language.

did you miss the op?

[NoOneIsIllegal]

I plan on majoring in a language
Why are you worrying then? Translating for corporations and business meetings pays out the ass. My old Spanish teacher use to translate meetings in the summer, and during those 3 months, would make more than he did during 9 months of teaching. You have to think, most teachers (depends on the state) make between 35-55k a year... He was making more than that in just mere weeks. You'll be fucking set dude.

[Metacomet]

I'll have to second the foreign language suggestion.

Do it. You won't regret it. I really regret not doing it. Spanish, Portuguese, French, Mandarin, Arabic........doesn't really matter. With that and English, you are wanted the world over.
.

[MarxSchmarx]

I assume that while you say you want to study languages after you graduate high school, you also want the "college experience".

Then anonymousOne is correct, just go to community college and take a lot of language classes to figure out what culture also interests you and transfer to a 4 year program in that are. Unless the language you want to learn is only taught at very specific schools, or if it is a dead language (in which case I'd advise to get another career path).

If you're just keen on learning about a culture and a language, here's what you should do. Do whatever you can to get a menial job, save every penny you make and couch surf/live off potato chips. Do this for a year. If you are doing this in a developed country, you will have enough money to make about 4-5 trips to a destination of your choice. Pick a language. Then find a volunteer organization where the language is spoken that will cover your room and board, or where somebody will let you live with them for a nominal fee. Then work your butt off for two years in that country and move on. If you do this in a multilingual country like India or Malaysia or work with indigenous people somewhere you will pick up several languages. If you can find work there, great! But it's pretty hard in most places, so that's why I encourage you to work to save up enough money first.

In any event, there is no experience like living in a place to understand how the language is used, how the people think and how the customs work. A reputable organization that works with you abroad will do far more than any university education.

[Aspiring Humanist]

Well I originally wanted to study the languages and history of the balkan region, but now I'm more interested in eastern european-central asian languages like russian (predominately), ukrainian, turkmen, uzbek etc

[Libertador]

As a Linguistics student I have to commend you for your desire to pursue language. There are a ton of opportunities for translation/interpreter work. My uncle is a converted Muslim and as part of his desire to learn more Arabic he moved to Qatar to teach English for a few years. He basically became completely proficient in Arabic and is now making $110k a year as an interpreter for Microsoft and Apple.

I would suggest the Peace Corps. They help to pay down student loan debt and everything else in the program is paid for.

[Aspiring Humanist]

I would totally take your advice except working for the United States government is morally wrong to me, are there any programs that help with debt that don't associate you with murderous imperialistic nation killing culture raping governments?

[Libertador]

I would totally take your advice except working for the United States government is morally wrong to me, are there any programs that help with debt that don't associate you with murderous imperialistic nation killing culture raping governments? One could speak the same qualms for joining in any human rights/overseas volunteering organization that receives federal funding. Which is most of them.

There is still AmeriCorps and SponsorChange.Org aside from the Peace Corps. Also, teachers working in public schools usually get automatic loan forgiveness if you work in areas that need good teachers.

If you're truly against working for any government agency or sponsor then it appears to me you're fairly out of luck. I would personally suggest going with the cheaper option for your undergraduates and then going for the more expensive route for your master's degree. If you've done well universities will usually help to pay or even completely cover the cost.