Just Say No to College Debt

Today, I read two articles in the Boston Globe that got me thinking about responsibly paying for college these days or, for me, 12 years in the future. This first article included the good news that job hopes are on the rise for college graduates this year. However, the article included the depressing news that "only 46 out of every 100 college graduates landed a job in their chosen field in 2010, the most recent data available, according to research from Northeastern University’s Center for Labor Market Studies." That means that a little less than half of those graduating from college are able to get a job using the degree that they (or their parents) spent big bucks to get. Many graduates are also going deeply into debt into the six figures for their degree.

In the other article, "Consumer bureau offers tool to help compare college costs", Michelle Singletary explains that her daughter is currently looking at colleges. Michelle and her husband have enough saved to pay for in-state tuition to a state school. They have explained to their daughter that if she wants to go to a more expensive private school, then she has to find scholarships or grants to pay the difference. They also will not be taking out any loans. Given the news in the first article, I think that this strategy makes perfect sense. If you have less then a 50 percent chance of getting a job, why burden yourself with student loan debt? When my future college student is a freshman in high school, I plan on assessing how much we have saved in his college fund and what type of college education that we can realistically afford. We'll make it clear and set the expectations of what schools we can afford. We will also adhere to Michelle Singetary's no-student-loans-whatsoever policy. This way, my son Alex can limit his search of schools to the ones that we can afford to pay for in full. We will also make sure that he understands that his college experience needs to prepare him for the work he plans to do when he graduates. We want to do whatever it takes to increase the odds that he will part of the half of college graduates that leave school with a job.