Opinions

Our View: Forgive some loan debt and we’ll graduate quick

To live in a world where people would forgive you for your college debt seems like a fantasy for students.

Many of us are just swimming in debt, and while the thought of graduating sounds like a relief, we know it really is not. Just six months after receiving our diploma the reality of paying off our student loans finally sets in.

However, the University of Texas at Austin has an idea. The UT wants to try out a program that offers students an incentive to graduate school on time.

This incentive involves relieving students of part of their student loan debt.

Alright, now we are listening loud and clear.

UT will enact as a pilot program next year which will offer a random selection of incoming freshman a chance to forgive some of their student loan debt if they graduate on time.

Like most other schools across the nation, the UT is struggling to get students out in four years, so it wants to provide an incentive program that encourages students to work harder.

The incentive program addresses a growing problem throughout the nation – that graduates cannot pay off their student loan debt because of their lack of jobs.

One half of the 200 freshmen selected for the program will be offered $1,000 in loan relief plus interest if they pass 15 units of courses each semester.

The other half will be forgiven $2,000 plus interest if they pass 30 units through the whole academic year.

If this pilot program works, then the UT plans on expanding it to apply to all of its students.

Well, students of the UT pilot program: we, at Cal State Long Beach, hope you do not mess this up.

In fact, we are sure students across the nation are pulling for this program to be a success.

At CSULB, we suffer under similar circumstances.

Many of us are taking more than four years to graduate, and as our tuition keeps growing so do our student loans.

We would love to see an incentive program that could offer us some extra help. It would be encouragement for us to work harder to graduate on time.

However, if this student loan forgiveness program does work, students here in California should not hold their breath.

We need  to take a step back and look at the big picture and realize that the odds of CSULB implementing an incentive program is slim.

The reason why our tuition is increasing because money is tight.

We are getting charged just enough to keep our education at the level it is now.

To offer a program that forgives student loan debt does not fit into our current situation.

But, it should be something California higher education should keep in its back pocket later down the road. It is an incentive future students would appreciate.

 

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