joecollegedad

--Item today in the Chicago SunTimes. --

....My comment: the college financial aid process is a mess and needs fixing!...

http://www.suntimes.com/news/educati...CIDE24.article

Crushing debt
SUICIDE | Man who owed as much as $100,000 felt trapped by his student loans and 'lower than low' that he had no job

September 24, 2007
BY DAVE NEWBART Staff Reporter/dnewbart@suntimes.com
Jan Yoder was preparing for her son's funeral when the phone rang. It was another student loan collector wanting to know when her son would pay up.

Her terse response: Jason is dead. And, she said, "You are part of the reason he took his own life.''

It was those calls and the burden of crushing debt, she says, that led her depressed son to take the drastic action of killing himself late last month. He did so in the Illinois State University chemistry building in Normal -- in the very lab where he did his research to earn his master's degree....

"It made him feel lower than low to tell somebody every week, 'I don't have a job,'" his mother says now. "It drags you down. You feel like nothing.''

Jason, 35, owed more than $65,000, according to the National Student Loan Data Service. But it's possible his debt was higher because that figure only includes government-backed loans and not the high-interest private loans students increasingly rely on. He told family members his debt had grown to more than $100,000.

While relatives acknowledge Yoder had fought depression on and off for years, advocates for student borrowers say his case is another example of a student feeling trapped by student debt. Unlike most other debt, the loans cannot, by law, be discharged through bankruptcy, and collection agencies have extraordinary powers to collect them by garnisheeing wages or even Social Security benefits...."

Majesa

Well...that's quite a story. I'm guessing that until at least a few more thousand people die in the same manner, lenders and friends will continue to look the other way.

2by2

Well- I know it is unkind to say- but once again, where is personal responsibility here? Where were the parents when the kid took out those kind of loans- is it really that expensive to go to UofI? And there are jobs, no not glamorous ones that we may have thought we earned going to graduate school but still - he was depressed- that's why he killed himself. Of course the grieving mother blames the student loans, in time she'll probably blame herself as well...it's the nature of grief. Does there need to be reform on lending especially to college kids? Yes, but is it their fault this young man took his life? No, I don't agree.

tomslawsky

He was a moron. Wanna bet he wasnt depressed when he was drinking beer and chasing women after he cashed the checks?

princessbell

It's not the fault of the lenders, but this is an indirect yet terrible call for reform. Private universities are out of control. Interest rates are out of control. This is getting completely ridiculous. And, yes, you may say, just go to University of XYZ, but then there are people like those on CC, not to mention the rest of the world, who say, go there and you're going to go nowhere. So this is something that everyone, colleges, lenders, governments, and even parents need to look at and remember and think about.

red remote

I'd love to see this guy's credit card bills and grades from college.

red remote

Also, it is his fault that he did not work hard enough in school and in his life to get into a need-blind school because he obviously was not too affluent if he killed himself over 100k

mojojojo69

Hello? its not all his responsibility...its the school and the nations responsibility to provide affordable education to its students, regardless of state residency.

kyledavid80

Wow ... just wow.

illuminar

I think some of the posts in this thread really indicate the skewed lense through which some people on these boards look at things

warblersrule86

They do. That's what public universities are for. I agree with 2by2, harsh though it may be.

This is certainly a tragic situation, though, and I find it particularly disturbing since many posters have considered shouldering such debt (see the "Is Yale worth $100k" thread).

mojojojo69

I guess illinois state university (the school that buried the guy in $100,000) is not a public school. You are right...its totally affordable!

mojojojo69

How can you guys make fun of him? he was a good student, and he was poor. It wasnt his fault. In this case, it was the school!

Roger_Dooley

I don't think suicide is a typical response to student loan overload, but there is a cautionary tale here. Lenders WILL lend to students who don't have a clear plan for getting out of debt after they graduate, who major in fields with limited job prospects, etc. One can't fault the lending process entirely - they can't pick which students will succeed in their chosen profession, which will move on to law school or business school, and which will leverage their undergrad degree into a series of jobs that barely pay the rent.

I do think that colleges need to put the brakes on their tuition and fees, which have outpaced inflation every year for decades. Most colleges, though, have a surplus of applicants and most of them come up with the money - we'll probably have to wait for the baby bust to see some price competition arise.

Any student contemplating heavy debt load needs to run the numbers and get some experienced financial input, whether it's from a parent or someone else. A big loan that will come due many years in the future is something that's hard for anyone to evaluate, but particularly difficult for younger folks who haven't paid off a house or even a car.

I'd be cautious in planning any debt amounts greater than the Stafford limits, particularly when starting as a freshman. Leave some room for unexpected circumstances, like parental job changes, needing an extra semester, etc.

In reading CC's forums over the years, I've seen some students get hung up on the belief that there is one perfect school they need to attend, even if it means racking up big debt. That's not true, and spending money that you don't have to chase that dream isn't worth it.

warblersrule86

mojojojo, it doesn't say that he did his undergrad at ISU. His MS, yes, but not necessarily his undergrad. The cost of ISU's grad school is approximately $16,500 per year as of 2007-2008. Even if he borrowed ALL of the money needed to pay this, his debt should be ~$33k, assuming he finished his MS in two years like most people.