Okay, so I'm a sophomore in a public high school. I have all A's and my predicted ACT score is 33-36, and I know people that have gotten full ride scholarships for 33, but I'm not willing to bet on that for myself right now. I'm really being pushed into a college education, but I'm afraid of the debt. Sure, I would love to get a degree in an academic area that I'm passionate about (journalism, music, economics, who knows), but I really don't know if I can pull it off with this financial crisis.
Do you guys have any recommendations of jobs that may just require education from a trade school, but don't require any involvement in a union? What is a good way to start your own business without getting into major debt? Thanks.
I'm concerned that you feel you are "being pushed into a college education." College is a personal choice, and no one should force you into it. You're wise to be afraid of the debt. The debt is real and can be a huge burden on your life and relationships (especially marriage). Unlike other forms of debt,
student loans follow you forever; you can declare bankruptcy a million times and your college loans will still be there. They are not discharged in a bankruptcy unless you can prove severe hardship. Good luck with that
I agree with the previous members who suggested doing part of your course work at a community college, and that you especially shouldn't go to college just because it's "the next step." The bachelor's degree is, for the most part, simply big business - they just want your money (It's not simple coincidence that student loans don't go away in a bankruptcy). I say this from the perspective of someone who has been around "higher" education for the better part of 10 years; I have B.A., B.S., and M.S. degrees from an ivy league college and am currently working on a PhD in engineering at a state university.
Without knowing more about your educational background and career goals, I can't give specific advice. I'm particularly non-helpful in the music education arena, although I will suggest you investigate Full Sail University for an associates degree if you're interested in the recording arts (
http://www.fullsail.com/). It's basically a trade school, like you mentioned in your original post. I have a friend who went there and did well for himself. I don't know much about the price tag, though.
If you want a bachelor's degree, you can get it for a very reasonable price if you don't mind doing it the unconventional way. Gary North, a contributor to Lew Rockwell (
http://www.lewrockwell.com/), has written a good guide for high school students who want to get their degree without going into massive debt. It's a free guide and, although the website is a little cheesy, the advice he gives is very good. I recommend taking a couple of hours to read through it carefully. Here is the website:
http://www.lowestcostcolleges.com/
Here is an excerpt from the guide that I think sums things up nicely:
By using a combination of AP, CLEP, DSST, and Ohio University, you can get a bachelor’s degree for under $12,000. The Ivy League schools charge $155,000: room, board, tuition, and books. (Yale charges $164,000.) Factor in transportation and other expenses, and it approaches $160,000, or it will after the next four years of tuition increases. Let me assure you, there is no way that the education at an Ivy League school is 13 times better than what I have proposed here. The hours in the day are not enough, and your IQ is not high enough, to overcome 13 to one. You will not earn 13 times more money based on where you earn your B.A., Harvard vs. Ohio University.
It is time for me to let you in on a little-known fact that the Ivy League schools would prefer than the public not know about. The U.S. Department of Education has published a report, College Quality and the Earnings of Recent College Graduates. The researchers studied the relationship between a bachelor’s degree from private, expensive, academically selective colleges and the graduates’ wages. Then they compared these economic returns with degrees from less expensive state universities. They concluded that, for males, the additional earnings that can be attributed to the quality of the college that issued the degree are between 11% to 16%. For females, this is 12%. (This assumes that the women remain in the labor force full-time.) The report concluded: “From this perspective, students may choose to avail themselves of the least expensive alternative that provides the major in which they are interested.”
I'm not going to knock highly selective undergraduate colleges - I went to one myself, loved it, and believe the education to be of much higher quality than the average college. However, as Gary North points out, it's not a wise economic decision. That is of course, unless your parents can pay for it out of pocket without blinking an eye.
There is also a wealth of other higher ed information at
http://www.lewrockwell.com/
Just go to the bottom of the home page and do a search for "college debt" or "higher education" and you'll find lots of great articles.
Edit: Regarding starting your own business without going into debt, the simple answer is..... don't finance it with debt!
Get a job, save lots of money and learn about the business you want to start while you're saving up for it. Read books about it, work in the business, talk to people who have started successful businesses in that area. It's cliche, but there are simply no shortcuts here.
