The Cost of College

In 10 months, I will be attending a college. In four years and 10 months, I will be in debt.

According to statistics reported by The College Board, the cost of tuition in 2033 is predicted to be an average $94,800 for public in-state college for four year. For private colleges it is predicted to be $323,900 tuition. That’s a lot of dollar iced teas from McDonald’s. Or 197.5 twelve hour work-days, working everyday, making ten bucks an hour. And that’s just the tuition, not including fees like books, food costs and housing.

The rising costs of an already exponential college tuition price will create larger debt for young adults, who are then having to find a job in a market that is against them. The cost of college tuition needs to be capped at public, state universities to help with student loans and debt.

College tuition costs are rising faster than the rate of inflation, according to Bloomberg. Only a big change in the student loan system and tuition costs will stop this.

Bernie Sanders proposed free college as one of the staples of his presidential campaign. Obviously, as a high school junior I “Felt the Bern” and thought this was a great idea, despite the increase in national debt. Instead of completely free, I propose a cap at 10-15 thousand dollars of yearly tuition for public colleges, similar to cost in England and a little over the average cost in in-state tuition in the U.S. of $9,650.

This tuition capping is not unheard of. England caps tuition costs for public colleges at 9,250 euros a year,a round 12 thousand dollars, and in Germany all public college is free. Education should not cost the next ten years of your life paying off debt.

Because of the U.S.’s educational financial system, it is virtually impossible for a student not to get a loan. So there is always the backup of getting loans for students going to college and they pay less attention to overall costs.

So, universities can continue to raise prices because students will pay for them, increasing the amount of student loan debt and the inflation of tuition costs.

Students applying for colleges right now: make sure to read, or at least skim, the “I Agree” prompts because a lot of them involve financial aid, on the Common App, FAFSA and other applications. Also make sure to consider how many student loans you are going to need when going to an out-of-state or private college.

Until there is a cap on tuition costs, lowering the need for student loans and making student loans harder to get, the cost of college will keep rising faster than the rate of inflation. And keep costing an insane amount of dollar iced teas.

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