College Is SO Expensive...

Today as I was preparing for the fall semester to start up, I decided to figure up how much college really costs. Of course, there's books and tuition that everyone thinks of, but there is SO much more that goes into it than just that. Room and board, food, gas to and from classes, the time it takes, parking permits, project supplies, laptops, printers, paper, and the list goes on and on...

It's very difficult to be working a full-time job and going to school at the same time, but what choice do I have? I don't see how it would be fiscally possible to go to school full time and not go into some pretty crazy debt! Here are a few numbers I put together for the average full-time student (assuming they're taking 12 credit hours, but many students take way more than that):

Tuition: $1,400
Books: $600-800
Rent (5 months): $2,500
Utilities/Bills (5 months): $1,300
Gas/Commuting Expenses: $1,000
Parking Permit/Student Fees: $75
Groceries/Food: $1,300

Even if those were the only items that were necessary to succeed in college, not counting all the miscellaneous expenses like clothing and printer cartridges and all that other good stuff, we're already talking $8,375 for ONE semester! If a driven college student can finish in 8 semesters, you're looking at $67,000 to receive an education and a piece of paper that says you either know what you're talking about or you were lucky and sat by the girl who knew what she was talking about.

To me, $67,000 is a heck of a lot of money just for a diploma that will mean I can maybe make a little bit more money on my salary every year. In my situation, I'll probably only get a raise of $3,000 per year when I graduate. That means that in 22 years, I'll start reaping the benefits of my college education, because it won't be until then that I'll be making enough money to offset the expenses that my bachelors degree cost me... I am one of the lucky few who don't actually have to worry about incurring alot of student debt. But for those of you out there that do, I feel your pain!

Yours (but with very little money),

Rachel E. Mawhirter