I am currently enrolled in my local community college and plan to transfer next academic year. I will have completed two years of college in one year and am transferring after only one year at my CC.
I have a college fund with currently ~$23k in it, by the end of this year I assume it will have approximately $21-$22k. I live in Southern California and want to attend Sacramento State in Northern CA. I totalled up the cost of attendance of Sac State for two years and, if I choose the cheapest meal plan and a triple person dorm, the cost in total for two years would be $33,378. I also plan to get a teaching credential from CSUN (my local cal state) and live at home once I get my bachelor’s degree. The cost of the credential program is ~$6117. If I were to add these costs together and then subtract my available funds (assuming the worst and using the $21k number), I come out about $18,495 short. However, this number does not take into account working and adding to my college fund. I was in a tough situation for a while and have nothing to contribute to the cost currently because of this. However I recently have found better employment and plan to continue employment throughout my two years at Sacramento State. I would not be able to during the credential program as it is a condensed, intensive one year program. I do not think I can accurately estimate how much this would bring the debt down, but I think it is safe to say that it would be at least $1k-$2k, if not more.
I do not have the support of my parents as they do not want me to go away to college. However, going away to a cal state in a new area has been a dream for a long time. I want the college experience and since I live in CA the cheapest option is a state school, and Sac State is the cheapest option in Northern CA. I have worked extremely hard in my CC to complete two years in one and allow myself to have this experience with minimal debt. My question is, would $16k (or $18k if somehow I were unable to contribute to the cost at all) be too much debt for a high school teacher’s salary? Would this greatly inconvenience me in life? I know no debt is the most ideal situation, but is this much debt actually that crippling? I know there are also loan forgiveness programs for teachers, and that if I could not pay back the debt in 10 years I would qualify for PSLF but I can’t imagine it would take 10 years to pay off that debt?