John+V’s+2017+OpEd+Article



College is Way Too Expensive

Nowadays it is college costs an absurd amount of money. It cost an average of $22,261 to attend an in-state public university. This is just for a public school. Public schools should be available for everybody who meets the educational standard for that school, but at these absurd prices it is out of the question for many people to attend these colleges. 40% of low income students who are accepted to universities don’t even attend for one semester because they can’t afford it. Their only option is to attend a two year junior college where they can only earn an associate's degree.

The increase in cost of going to college does not just affect the lower class population. The middle class has also been greatly affected by it. It was once possible to “pay your way” through college by getting a job, but in the past 25 years tuition has risen 440%, and it is no longer possible to do this. You also can’t just rely on your parents to pay for your college tuition unless you’re rich, especially if you have multiple siblings. So, your only option is to take out a student loan. This may seem like a good solution, but this loan will most likely become a burden on you for years. The average class of 2016 graduate leaves school with $37,172 in student loan debt. On average it takes 21 years to pay off this debt. If that doesn’t scare you then this stat certainly will. Today student loan debt stands at nearly $1.3 trillion dollars.This amount exceeds the total national credit-card debt. Student loan debt has become a huge problem and it appears that it is only getting worse.

College has become so expensive that many people are just choosing not to attend it. A nationwide Pew [|__study__] showed that 57% of students believe that a college degree no longer carries a value worth the cost. So more people are deciding to skip out on college and just go straight into the workforce because of the ridiculous cost of college. This is not good for our country, we should encourage more people to go to college and earn an education, but because of how expensive college is less people are doing so and our country is becoming less educated.

If the cost of college continues to trend up, college will become a privilege that only the elite will be able to enjoy. The middle class will soon, like the lower class, be unable to go to college and get the four year education they deserve. We need to instead lower the price of college to make it affordable to everybody so everyone can have an equal opportunity to succeed in life. College should be a right that every student has, not a privilege for the ones who can cut the biggest checks.