Adult Education

President Biden announced his forgiveness of student loan debt of up to $10,000 for debtors making $125,000 a year or less and debt of up to $20,000  for recipients of Pell grants.  Biden hoped to strike a middle ground in keeping a campaign promise he'd made during the 2019-20 Democratic presidential nomination campaign, before half of his opponents dropped out without making it to Iowa and before COVID changed everything.

Republicans and even some Democrats have argued against Biden's move, saying that it will exacerbate inflation and that it is unfair to those who saved their money to go to college or send their kids to college and to those who never went to college.  Republicans in particular are mad about redistributing wealth to middle-class and young Americans because it doesn't redistribute wealth to their corporate donors, the same people who have made America an awful place to live for the past fifty years.   Among the Democrats who have opposed the President and taken a stand meant to appeal to folks who never sought higher education is U.S. Representative Tim Ryan, competing against the non-college-educated voters in the Ohio U.S. Senate race against his Republican opponent, that guy named Mountain William Elegy. 😛 

To those who want to know why it is appropriate to forgive the debt of those who took out loans to go to college and had a hard time paying them back, let me try to provide some answers.  A lot of these debtors took out loans with a plan to pay them back but ended up being underemployed due to recessions or changes in their chosen professions. Also, many debtors have had to pay exorbitant interest adding up to twice as much of their original loans.   They didn't live large while going to school and they watched every cent that went to basic necessities - and they still got screwed.  So people have to understand that many of those who still owe money on their student loan debts owe it through no fault of their own. 

As far as I can see it, the biggest flaw in Biden's plan, other than that it's not bipartisan, is that it does nothing to address the high costs of college.  No one wants to talk about that, though, because it would involve paring down athletic programs and other elements of campus life that have nothing to do with higher education.  Also, no one ever proposes that something be done about schools  called colleges and universities that don't live up to their names, schools where people, whether they have debt or not, struggled to become educated and get a respected degree and thought they'd done that, only to realize that they're not much wiser or more intellectual than when they started.  We have a  problem when you realize that Malcolm X studied Wittgenstein in prison while folks who went to Florida State can barely put two and two together. 

As for my own personal situation with school, my father paid for my undergraduate education, and my only responsibility was to graduate - which I did, in 1988.  But I was expected to pay for graduate school.  I've talked about this before, but let me go into greater detail.  I applied to Boston University's School of Journalism and got accepted for the fall 1989 semester.  When it became apparent that I would not be able to attend that semester,  I re-applied and was accepted again, even as I prepared to apply for alternative choices.  But a more broad communication master's somehow made more sense, so I had to re-apply to Boston University's School of Communications even as I was trying to apply to other communications schools.  Before I could re-apply to Boston University or apply to other schools like Temple, I got fired from my job, and efforts to get another full-time job failed - largely because I had the attitude that I would be in grad school in another part of the country soon enough.  Boston University was not going to work out, so I called it quits on that.  I managed to apply to the University of Massachusetts' communications school and I even went up to Amherst for an interview with the school's dean, but when I got back I lost another job.  By this time, it was August 1989, and a few months later I was working at a temporary Christmas job in the mall when I heard from the University of Massachusetts and learned that I was rejected.  Based on the interview I had, I'd figured as much.  By the end of 1989, I had given up on graduate school for two reasons:

• I couldn't figure out a way to pay for it without going deep in debt.
• I didn't really want to go to graduate school anyway.  It was my father who wanted me to go, and he wouldn't pay this time. I hadn't liked school since I was . . . six years old. 

I did return to school - I earned an editing certificate from New York University's School of Continuing Professional Studies - and I paid for it in full without having to take out a loan.  I got my certificate right after the great financial crisis of 2008 and 2009, and subsequent efforts to get a job at editing failed.  The editing skills I picked up have since atrophied.  (As a sign of what was to come, my car died in the Lincoln Tunnel when I was on my way to the last class of my last course.  I made it to class, but my car would need a major repair.)

I'm not sorry I never earned a master's degree in journalism or communications, mainly because thanks to a decade's worth of experience as a reporter, I realize that you don't learn anything in journalism or communications school that you don't learn on the street.  And the biggest reason I'm glad I never went to graduate school is because . . . well, I'm a reporter, so I know I could never pay back a student loan!