Student Debt: Is It Worth It?

As a student, one of my greatest concerns regarding higher education is whether or not it is worth the price. Will I be left in debt with little to show for it? Scholars have argued for years that these concerns are justified and that the cost of higher level education is rising beyond the point of sustainability, resulting in an economic crisis. Robin Wilson, on the other hand, contends that such fears are exaggerated. Robin Wilson is a reporter for the Chronicle of Higher Education with 25 years of experience dedicated to reporting on higher education. In her article “A Lifetime of Student Debt? Not Likely,” published in Washington, D.C. in May of 2009, Wilson provides hard facts and anecdotes with one main point in mind: acquiring a reasonable amount of debt for your education is a good investment. Wilson makes some very compelling points that are still relevant, and by and large, I agree with her at this very moment. However, some things have changed since Wilson wrote about student debt and this issue may not be so cut and dried. As interest rates change and the price of a college education increases, her argument makes less and less sense. Though for the time being, her main point still remains viable. Wilson shows us that most graduates have borrowed within reason: “a third of graduates leave college with no debt at all for their education. Of the the 65 percent who face debt, the average they owe is around $20,000,” (Wilson 257). Only 8 percent of undergraduates borrow at least twice the national average. These relative few provide us with the horror stories that we see in the news, and are what Wilson calls the “vocal minority”, (Wilson 257). If that doesn't confuse the issue enough, “undergraduate debt is frequently conflated with graduate and professional-school debt...which is typically much, much higher...for example, medical-school graduates borrowed an average of $113,661.” (Wilson 259). This means that the data used to argue from the point of an