The Cost of Education: How hard have you been hit?

[Soviet Heavy]

University costs money. Tuition rises, residence fees rise, utility fees rise. The tradition of "working part time in the school year, and full time in the summer" just doesn't cut it for some people. Like myself. I've basically been financially forced out of school, so I'm taking this semester off to work, because I just can't afford it.

The main trouble started last year. First year, I had my nice highschool grant along with my OSAP loan, which covered pretty much everything. I'd also had roughly $2000 in the bank saved up from work. Well, when residence fees, tuition and everything came off, that 2000 nugget went into food and gas money. It didn't last long at all.

Come the summer, where I had a job only to be forced out of it by a boss who didn't like me, and I was stuck in the rut where no new jobs were being offered until the fall. So I made no money during that summer. I also hadn't received any more scholarship money, so I was totally reliant on the OSAP loan.

Thing is, OSAP pretty much screwed me over. They don't take into account that money you make might not all be going towards education. That $2000 was entirely for groceries and other necessities. But OSAP applications require you to declare any money you've made, as well as your parent's income in order to determine how much they will give you for your loan. Again, not factoring in other costs.

So, second year, my OSAP came out to $6000. Across two semesters. At The University of Guelph, residence alone costs aroudn $2800 per semester. Couple that with tuition and food, and you get the picture. I had to be bailed out by my mom both semesters because of this issue. All the while working whenever I could part time between classes.

This year, I just couldn't do it. Even working all summer in a minimum wage job, most of my money again was going towards food and now rent (because fuck off paying three thousand dollars for residence all at once when I can pay a fraction of that on a monthly basis).

OSAP barely gave me anything, and I am scrabbling just to make ends meet with my rent and food. How the hell do they expect me to suddenly come up with the cash to pay for even one semester, let alone paying the loan back for the first two years? It's incredibly frustrating, and I can't turn to the parents for help anymore. My younger brother is now also in school, and supporting both is just too much for them. Surprise surprise, it turns out that all the money parents make doesn't all go directly towards education either OSAP. But that's fine, you continue to think that because my dad works at the military base that our house is swimming in money.

So, this is getting ranty, but I needed to vent. It's difficult adjusting to living on your own without a degree and little chance to break into high paying jobs (there aren't any around here).

TLDR: If you are/were a university/college student and had the same problem, how did you handle it? Did you find a way out, or did you do like me and put in on the back burner just to get by?

 

[Ryotknife]

I...was very lucky. Since I hit 15, my father forced me to work in construction over the summer. While it paid good money (especially with overtime) I was worked to the bone. Once Weds rolls around im basically dead on my feet after work. While most kids look forward to summer, I dreaded it.

That said, because of this (and delivering papers beforehand) I raised about 20,000 towards college. I didn't even have a car until I was 19, and im still using it 10 years later. Combine this with scholarships and decades old bonds (and working construction in the summer), and I managed to exit a $30,000 a year tuition college with about 15,000 in debt* which I managed to pay off in 5 years with a min wage job.



Now, there is a big disclaimer with that last statement. Technically my debt was around $40,000, but my father signed on the 25,000 loan. When he passed away, the debt was forgiven. Course NOW there are new laws which says that forgiven debt = income.

However, if it makes you feel any better, I have a degree and I cant find a fulltime job in my field. I was working min wage for years after college, and now im....kinda using my degree? Its a part time job (in which I make about as much as I would on min wage) but at least its an engineering job....just not in the field I studied. Although the job is very interesting and is a nice life experience (I get to travel the country). I took it mostly for job experience.

 

[McMullen]

I was also lucky; my dad agreed to fund my first four years, provided I maintained at least a 3.0 GPA. I still had to work to afford food, phone service, and other necessities, but was able to do so with on-campus work. Ten years later, I'm attending grad school in a department that doesn't take people it can't provide funding for through TA or RA positions. In exchange for the work I do for the department, my tuition is waived and I get a small stipend that's just enough to cover my expenses (I've never owned a car and try to have as few bills as possible).

I've seen others go through college without these advantages, and seeing their experience has made me very aware of how lucky I've been.

 

[Guffe]

I live in Finland.

Our education system up to the age of 19 (not sure if it's the same as high school...) is basically "free".
When we work here we pay about 17-20% of our salary to the state, they then use that money to give the basic education of 9 years (7-16) for free to the children and then after that school itself doesn't cost that much but only the books and materials you need to buy.
And not even our colleges and universities are anywere near as costly as in the states.
So me for example pay my food and living (rent which I sahre with a friend), school material and the term fee (not sure what that is at the moment, but not too much if I remember correctly)
But I also worked my ass of summers and during school since the age of 15 so I have good savings. But I do have friends who live of noodles and water who spend their money on everything they shouldn't.

If there are any Finns who study in the University at the moment, feel free to correct me

 

[Thaluikhain]

Finished a diploma a few months back. Cutbacks meant it was more expensive, though not by that much (next year fees are going up something like 7 fold, though).

However, it used to be a 12 month course, now it's only 6 months. My class was the first one to do the new shorter one, and the teachers didn't know what we were doing. In the end, they didn't bother with a few tests, and one project ended up being us copy the teacher's code because we had no time to learn it.

 

[King of Wei]

Junior at USF and college hasn't cost me a dime. Money I get from the state for visual impairment covers tuition/books and my family lives 10 minutes from campus so I've been living at home for free. The only downside, judging from some e-mails I've gotten lately, it's going to be considerably harder to quality for blind services funding for spring 2014 onwards. Things many very well take a turn for the worse in the upcoming semester, but I've been very, very fortunate up to this point.

 

[Foolery]

I could pay for the tuition for almost five 2 year technical trade programs with 30,000 dollars and be making decent money afterwards. So, no. Not hit hard at all. Seems like a foolish amount of money to be pumping into school.

 

[Esotera]

I was in the last year of the UK to get tuition fees of £3000 rather than £9000 a year, so it could have been a lot worse. Including the cost of living, I reckon it's probably cost around £30,000 to do a 4 year course, and I've earned a fair amount of money on my placement year so that can probably be cut down to about £20k.

 

[Quaxar]

I always feel bad in these threads, living in a country where uni costs a measly 18? a semester if you finish it in its alloted time plus two extra semesters before turning 26. And even after that it's only something like 700? per year.
So, uh... I'm not exactly hit by anything right now.

 

[Niflhel]

Denmark have this lovely system where, instead of paying tuition fees, the government instead pays you roughly 1000$ a month if you study, with the option of borrowing another 600$ at favorable rates if you'd like, and being able to earn a certain amount of money from work every month without it affecting the money you receive from the state. So, it's safe to say, getting an education here is quite easy for just about anyone.

 

[Starik20X6]

The NSW state government recently imposed a massive education spending cut, based on figures that were later determined to be actually a few million dollars less than what money they actually had. Naturally, this didn't stop the cuts from happening.

Now, luckily for me, this year will be the last year before the cost of TAFE[footnote]For those unaware, TAFE is kind of like a technical college, more 'practical' than University.[/footnote] courses skyrockets. Unluckily, this means that I'll either have to finish my education at the end of the year and try to get a job with the skills I currently have, or spend a gazillion dollars to continue. Gotta weigh up if the extra time and money is worth it...

 

[Aedes]

Public universities here in Brazil are actually free. Assuming you pass the vestibular, of course. Something like an entry exam since there's only a limited number of slots per semester. Also, unlike the public basic education, public Unis are considered good. Go figure.

However, only the education is free. Food, transport and those little extras that aren't from the Uni itself but are a necessity nonetheless must be covered by you. I was lucky compared to most of my friends since my parents covered those expenses for me.

captcha: gold medal
Thank you, captcha! Feels nice to have some acknowledgement.

 

[DanielBrown]

Greetings from Sweden where studying isn't only free, they pay us for it.
lolololol

Seriously though; I'm not joking. The money we get isn't enough to live on if you live by yourself and am the only income in the household though. I didn't last in my higher learning school for long, but the first month I got ~6400SEK($1000) iirc. If you need more you'd have to take loans on top of the money you get, which can quickly pile up to huge amounts.

 

[Mr F.]

27,000 pounds in total for tuition. (9,000 a year)
3,500 pounds a year to cover all forms of food, rent and the rest. Yeah, this year that covers my rent and leaves me with 200 pounds fuck about money.

That 37,500 pounds of debt by the time I get my degree.

58833.75 US Dollar at current exchange rates.

And there are very few jobs where I live, hoping to find one in a gentlemans outfitters this year. Seriously, without my mother paying for me to stay alive (She paid for my two sisters. Well, my mother and father paid for them. He is dead now.) I would simply not be able to go to University.

If I fail any of my years I have to drop out. Cannot afford to take another years worth of debt, nor can my mother afford to pay for a 4th year.

Fuck this government.
Fuck the last government.

If I had not messed up my life epically, I would have graduated by now. Oh, and be in *maths* 13500 pounds of debt, instead of 37500 pounds of debt (Hence the rage. This government trippled tuition fees. The last government did the same. My parents were paid to go to university.).

The icing on the cake? I want a civil service job. I am doing all of this to work for the fuckers who have fucked the students into the floor in the first place. You would think that considering my career goals SOMEONE would want to pay for me?

Nope!

Denmark have this lovely system where, instead of paying tuition fees, the government instead pays you roughly 1000$ a month if you study, with the option of borrowing another 600$ at favorable rates if you'd like, and being able to earn a certain amount of money from work every month without it affecting the money you receive from the state. So, it's safe to say, getting an education here is quite easy for just about anyone.

We used to have a very similar system

Then some asshole went "Hey, one of the few good things about this country is our education system! We should fuck that. Fuck poor people getting an education and then getting angry, University is for the settled middle classes and the rich!"

Oh, and apparently produces studies stating that the decrease in poor people going to university has nothing to do with the amount of debt they will be in roughly tripling. And no Universities are doing anything about it. And the students have stopped caring, stopped protesting, because nobody at the top listens.

And then its a surprise when a riot occurs because the poorest of the poor have no fucking prospects, no chance of real employment, poor chances of real education but apparently that is just "Plain and simple criminality" because that is a thing, people just choose one day to steal shit and smash up shops and get into running battles with the police, it has nothing to do with endemic societal problems, the collapse of the mobilised working classes, the death of Trade Unionism and Thatcher and her fucking "There is no such thing as society", it DEFNITELY has nothing to do with all of that. Nor does it have anything to do with the working classes being victimised in just about every form of media we have in this country.

>.>

Oh god, I am ranting.

Sorry.

(Yes, I know I simplified the riots. I can go into far more depth as to the real causes of said rioting if you wish. However, education does play a very large part.)

Spoiler: Vaguely not safe for work. Involves the word fuck multiple times.

 

[Elementary - Dear Watson]

I joined the military. I have enjoyed a few years enjoying a Uni style party lifestyle (and worked damn hard at times too... especially overseas) and am now settling down to do a degree whilst I serve. It is costing me £400 a year... whilst I am being paid for my job. The only downside being that I do it outside of a full time day job!

 

[shootthebandit]

I joined the military. I have enjoyed a few years enjoying a Uni style party lifestyle (and worked damn hard at times too... especially overseas) and am now settling down to do a degree whilst I serve. It is costing me £400 a year... whilst I am being paid for my job. The only downside being that I do it outside of a full time day job!

If you dont mind me asking what trade are you in the RAF?

On topic: tuition fees are pretty expensive in the UK but you dont start paying back your student loan until you earn above a certain amount (roughly 20k ($30k) a year). Fees are also capped at 9k a year. Personally i dont have a problem with this as a degree should be seen as an investment in yourself (i know im probably going to get a lot of hate for that). Theres a lot of mickey mouse courses out there and increasing the fees will make people think twice about getting a Phd in finger painting and not actually contributing to society.

I personally went down the route of doing an apprenticeship to become a contractor for the RAF. Getting roughly the same benefits as watson described without the marching and shooty stuff. I think the government should encourage more apprenticeships, and national service instead of leading kids to believe a degree is the ONLY way when in fact it isnt. I think learning on the job from other people and getting practical experience can be better than a degree. However for things like medicine or law where a lot of knowledge is required a degree is by far the best method

 

[Chemical Alia]

When I finished grad school, I had about $100,000 in student loans. Most of my undergrad was actually paid for by the military (voc rehab), aside from a loan I took out to study in Germany for a summer.

Since my interest rates on my private loans were terrible (most around 8-9%), my biggest priority was paying it off. Minimum payments were around $1000 a month. I knew I was taking a huge risk with my education, so I basically did nothing but work on my skills and my portfolio until I graduated, in the hopes of being baseline employable. I wish I had put that amount of effort into undergrad, honestly, I'd probably already be a much better artist :c

Basically after I graduated, I managed to find a job within six months, but I'm not gonna kid myself. Almost four years later, I've managed to pay off just about all of my debt, but the only way I was able to do it was by "making hats" for TF2 (winning that contest) and Dota 2. I'd probably be way in the hole for decades, otherwise.

 

[NoMercy Rider]

All I have to say is that student loans are the worst idea ever. Hindsight is 20/20, but looking back I wish my wife and I had taken out zero student loans, or kept it at an absolute minimum. When agreeing to sign student loans, there really should be some sort of indicator in regards to what sort of burden repayment will be once you graduate. I think that would open a lot of students' eyes and pursue other options.

The biggest hit we have taken is that my wife went to a private school that was largely funded by loans. Both of our parents were middle class so they weren't wealthy enough to set aside college savings, but weren't poor enough to qualify for grants.

Now that we are both graduated, we are paying essentially a home mortgage in monthly student loan payments. Together we make pretty good money, but a large chunk of it gets gobbled up by payments each month. Fortunately after 10 years most of the loans will be wiped away since we both work in government jobs and qualify for loan forgiveness. But there is one loan that doesn't qualify and equates to paying $300/mo for the next 25 years.

I know in the long run the higher education will pay for itself, especially with my nice engineering job with plenty of upward mobility potential, but right now it feels pretty shitty. We really want to buy a house but there is no way we can qualify for a home loan with our student debt. I seriously get depressed every time I think about it.

MY ADVICE TO INCOMING COLLEGE STUDENTS: DO NOT get student loans except as a last resort. Work part-time if you have to, but student loans will be a huge burden for at least the first five years after college. At the very least, run the numbers to see what kind of monthly payment you will be making and see if it is feasible. The government does offer lower monthly payments and other options if you hit a rough patch, but it is essentially paying off only interest and make no real progress.

 

[Myndnix]

I have evaded any and all costs, because I didn't get into university.
Oh well.

 

[Timotei]

Paying well over $2000 a semester (books, materials, etc. included) to attend classes. Unfortunately, since none of my transcripts from high school were found (how someone loses something that was sitting in a file cabinet is beyond me), I'm probably going to have to spend who knows how much longer filling my transfer requirements.

Luckily, I have a family member who's more than willing to pick up the tab until I can find a way to pay her back, which will be difficult considering there are absolutely NO jobs in my town (except for Wal-Mart, but I have my personal vendettas against them for putting my former employer out of business). My only hope for getting some money at the moment is to wait until my play is produced and wait to see what that brings in for me. And if it's liked enough, hopefully it'll stat making the circuits through smaller theaters. Still a big "if" though.