<p>It seems she graduated from San Bernardino Valley College with an associate’s. How was she able to even borrow that much in student loans?</p>
<p>There’s no way a 2 year instate community college program cost 200K in loans. What is the deal with this story? And if the family was cashing out loans for living expenses, why should anyone else pay them off? That’s a whole lot of living expenses. </p>
<p>^^^^She didn’t take out 200K, that’s just how the amount has grown with late penalties, etc.</p>
<p>Well then it shouldn’t be labeled 200K in student loans, because it wasn’t. </p>
<p>^^yeah, but that makes for a much better headline for so-called independent journalists (with a pov).</p>
<p>As I recall the loans were $100K which ballooned with late fees, etc. I have no idea how you accumulate $100K in loans for an in-state AA.</p>
<p>It probably depends how long it takes you to get it. I seem to recall stories about adult, working students in NY who racked up $40K of debt pursuing a degree at CC and never achieved it. If the student started out having to take remedial classes, for example, that could make it much more expensive.</p>
<p>Can one <em>really</em> become an RN with only an AA degree, btw?</p>
<p>I agree with mom2collegekids: we are not hearing the entire story. There are many fishy details. I hope that some reporter digs into this a bit more, just as further investigation illuminated the headline-grabbing story about the adjunct professor at Duquesne a few years ago.</p>
<p>I know someone who was an Ada Comstock Scholar at Smith, after starting at CC. She had two young children and a divorced spouse who was contributing nothing at all. She had to “go on welfare” in order to go to school full time and get her BA. (A worthy investment in the future by our society, IMHO.) I cannot imagine that this woman could not have done the same.</p>
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<p>Yes, some schools offer this. My local CC has a 1 year LPN program and a 2 year RN program. However, in many hospitals they are much preferring a BSN to an associates degree so I suspect 2 year RN programs will slowly disappear. </p>
<p>Consolation, yes, there are many ADN RNs out there. It is the exact same licensing exam. Go into any ICU, OR,or other hospital unit and you probably wouldn’t have any idea which were ADNs vs. BSN. The difference comes with regard to advancement into management. Also advanced practice RNs must not only have the BSN, but MS or higher. </p>
<p>And yes, many hospitals are switching to a new model where they only hire BSNs and/or require their ADNs to get the BSN by a certain date or be laid off.</p>
<p>I think the entire state of NJ moved to the BSN model. </p>
<p>It is my understanding that once you have a child, you become an independent student for financial aid and your parents income don’t count against you. I think others have said it already but it would seem that she should have qualified for much more financial aid and not needed these loans. It would be nice if a reporter would get the entire story since it doesn’t add up.</p>
<p>Well, not every school just gives you financial aid to cover the costs if you don’t have the money. That’s not how it works at all.</p>
<p>He thought he knew where he is getting into. His daughter suppose to repay those loans after graduation even they are in the parents name.</p>
<p>My main beef with these kinds of loans is how quickly they balloon into something impossible to pay off because of high rates and penalties if a person falls behind on payments – I don’t even understand why they are offered to students. Most students can’t qualify for a credit card or if they can, it will have a very low ceiling. At least that has been the case with my kids. So why are they able to take on this kind of debt? Because of the co-signers, I get that. But why is a person with a 75,000 income allowed to co sign with out some guidance? </p>
<p>There is something wrong with the system that encourages taking on this kind of debt with these kinds of terms. I agree with the posters that have the opinion that the financial institutions that offer these loans should insist on insurance in case of death. Or hardship. Maybe everyone should know what they are getting into. Ideally, they should, I’m all for that – and avoid these sorts of disastrous situations. But, maybe too, the people making these loans should spell out the worst case scenarios very clearly, and offer some guidance. It seems to me that they should.</p>
<p>There are people in this country who never want to say to someone that they can’t afford to go to the college of their dreams. These people have designed these loans so they don’t have to say that. We’ve created this fantasy that any college you can get into, you can go to. The high school counselors tell the kids that and the colleges themselves tell the kids that. College is not supposed to be something only the rich can afford to attend anymore. The same people created mortgages for everyone also and that blew up in our faces also. Anything that costs hundreds of thousands of dollars that you have to borrow money to get isn’t for everyone.</p>
<p>Plenty of people know the worst case scenario but they are not expecting that to happen. Obviously. This woman unfortunately passed away but the loans doubled while she was living. There was no way she was going to pay them off. Ever. And, it doesn’t sound as though the parents had any idea what was happening. </p>
<p>Sometimes if the parents do not cosign the loans, their child may not have access to enough fund to receive the education. I think this is especially true for a professional school (at least this is our experience. ) I think we have likely cosigned about 40% of my child’s student loan from his institute’s “alumni’s loan.” The interests rate is higher but a good part of that loan is that the payback could be deferred for 2 or 3 years after graduation when his income is still low (e.g., slightly less than 5K?) - I think another advantage is that the interests is not accrued while at school also.)</p>
<p>How is a father who earns 70K per year even able to cosign on a 100K loan? Because the bank is taking a high risk of likely default, they charge a high interest rate. It was nice that the bank reduced it’s interest rate given the circumstances of death. However, most loans or accounts payable are not discharged because of death. The federal plus loans might be discharged in the event of death because the federal government is going to cover that loss. But setting up a program like that is done by the government knowing that they will be taking taxpayer money to fund losses.</p>
<p>@intparent,
"But to have NO way to discharge these loans is inhumane. "
When people die, none of their debts are discharged. They are offset against their assets and paid off. If I give you a loan, I have a right to get paid back, regardless if you die. Sometimes the estate’s assets are not enough to cover the estate’s debts, and then the unsecured lenders are s*#t out of luck. But if there is a cosigner, then the cosigner is responsible for paying back the debt. this is the reason that most lenders do not want to give unsecured loans…because there is no way to collect if problems arise.</p>
<p>BTW, the parents can default on the loan and take a hit to their credit rating.</p>
<p>I definitely think that the penalties and late fees are a bit excessive to balloon a 100K loan to 200K and that this takes advantage of folks that want to borrow money.</p>
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<p>If there was a good answer to this question that’d be great, I haven’t heard one before. You don’t want to get inbetween a lender and borrower because that’s bad for the economy itself, if the borrower can produce more out of that money and pay back the loan with profit, then they should. And the borrower and lender themselves are much better judges of such than the government. But true, it’s bad for the economy when people who fail to produce from that money borrowed, because they have to worry about trying to pay back this loan and lenders have to worry about how they’re going to get their money back. The obvious solution to this would be to allow a provision to indenture the borrower to the lender at some point, but that’s a human rights violation or something like that. </p>
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<p>Problem is that what you said probably isn’t true. It’s probably not impossible that an 18 year old with a kid could go to college for nursing, graduate and work as a nurse, and pay off 100K in student loans. Unlikely definitely, but not impossible. And if it’s not impossible I’d personally be weary of supporting legislation to forbid that loan from happening. </p>