As Barack Obama attempts to bribe students for votes with student loans, I see a problem. Loans are part of what got us in trouble in the first place. Work is the solution, but giving people loans, particularly people who take out loans without intending to repay them, doesn't encourage work. There are great numbers of professional students who never get productive jobs. There are great numbers of people I know in Vegas who intend to walk away from their loans.
I was fortunate to leave college without ever taking out a loan and without debt. I worked very hard in High School and received some timely 'motivational counseling' from my mother by which I received several key scholarships. I chose to attend a small state institution to save money because my parents had already paid property taxes to support them. I took full loads, kept up my grades, and worked a part time job. I went without a car, a cell phone, and some of the expected costs. I didn't go out to eat. I also paid far less just ten years ago than the students pay today.
Even while I was in school, the costs ballooned. I remember going to the Housing unit and asking them why, during the two years of absentia for a mission, the cost to live on campus had doubled when it had taken 27 years to double the first time. They even offered less for the increased cost. Most of my classes were taught by professors, but some of my friends were not so fortunate and discovered their teachers were really graduate students, not worth the increased tuition cost.
I am not convinced that as much of education as they want us to believe is about education. I have already written about how universities exist, not to advance the students, but to advance the faculty and entertain the community. Why else do they invest so much money into the football team? Too many colleges staff famous professors who barely teach a single class. Aside from the difference the diploma makes on the date of hire, I see very little value added by attending a prestigious university. I have excelled, as did one of my favorite professors, despite going to a small and inconsequential school as he did (He went to Univ. of Nebraska for his PhD).
I don't see why there should be a need for federal intervention in student loans. Why does it cost so much? Our students are less competitive at a time when it costs more than ever before to attend college. The undergraduates where I teach pay more for undergraduate tuition than I paid in graduate school, and I'm younger than some of them are.
Recognizing that they are our customers, I try very hard to give the students a good value for the money. I worry about many of them who pay so much money to get a degree just to be competitive that it will bury them in debt for years. I remind them that grades do not indicate what they know and point out how, despite my pedigree and alma mater, I have been offered an expanded teaching schedule next semester. The department chair told me in my review that she was glad they had not only hired a competant instructor but also someone who was passionate for the students and for teaching. I consider myself worth the money. Others are paid much more. Not everyone earns what they are paid.
Some students have no choice but to go into debt. Realize that when you do so, you owe someone else for what you have and are. Debt is a new form of slavery. Once you pay them off, then and only then are you completely free. I am convinced that the government likes expanding student loans to make more people dependent on and beholden to them. They do not like that you are free, but that is exactly what America is supposed to represent- freedom. Remember that as you plan your educational financing.
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