I didn't have much. I think my total student loan debt was around $10 to $15,000, and luckily my parents covered that, which was the amount that remained after scholarships. I'm in a graduate program now, but it's being paid for by my employer.

I agree with you that debt is a part of life these days, but that's not necessarily a good thing, as our country's recent financial woes attest to. I think going into debt to finance higher education is fine if you're confident that you can land a good job after school. However, I know way too many people who get graduate degrees with no plans for what they want to do afterwards and then they're stuck with no job and an enormous debt on top of that. It makes me wonder if people in those type of situations would be better off not going to college at all.

Maybe I'm overly optimistic, but I think it's still possible to succeed without a college education. My husband dropped out of college and makes roughly 3x what I do per year. So, just do what feels right for you. If you land a job that you are passionate about and that makes you happy, the debt will be insignificant.

I will answer by telling what my son's debt for their college's is. First son graduated in 2003. His debt when he graduated was about $23,000. Second son graduated in 2007. His debt when he graduated was about $22,000. Close to the same thing, but the second son went to a slightly cheaper college. They both have BA's.
I agree with you. A BA is about the same thing that a high school diploma used to be. I think that best advice that college students could take today is to get through the undergrad program as fast as possible. If you don't have to do it, going five years to get an undergrad degree is a sucker's game.

I have taken out $3500 so far.

I took out about $30,000 in student loans. This is actually a lot better than it could have been, because I went to junior college for two years and it was extremely affordable.

I think you should take out as many loans as makes financial sense. For example, if you are planning on becoming a doctor or a lawyer, it makes sense to take out $150,000 (or more) in student loans, because once you graduate you will earn far more than that.

However, if you want to work for an environmental nonprofit group that will never pay better than $40,000, taking out the same $150,000 in debt doesn't make as much sense.

Another thing to note is that there are a number of organizations (for example, the federal government) who will help pay back your student loans every month. So if you do take out a large amount of loans, even though the government doesn't pay very well, they will help pay for your loans.

My husband and I have taken out $13,000 in student loans so far. We clearly took out more than we needed to since the college we are going to is only $4,000 a year- and we're barely through our Freshmen year.

I fell into the trap that it's okay to go into debt for college. The truth is, college guarantees you an education, (assuming you want it and work for it) it doesn't guarantee you a better job, a raise, or even a degree. Something could happen that prevents the degree...

By the time all is said and done, you've got the loans, but you might not have the income to pay for it- and even if you do you are paying interest on it! People rend to keep student loans for a long time since it has a low interest rate- sometimes it takes them up to 10 years to pay it off. The lower the payment, the more they pay in interest. Does that make sense?

The other interesting thing is that when you pay with cash, you never go over that amount. You can't- once the cash is gone, your done. When you've got loans, you may have your heart set on only paying $10,000 but when the bill comes out at $11,000 you go ahead and take that extra $1,000 loan instead of getting another job, or looking for alternatives.

Since my husband and I are still in school we pay about $50 in interest on our student loans every month. Most of our loans our subsidized. My husband and I decided to crack down and get a 2nd job this summer, cut our expenses, etc. and pay off all our debt by the end of this year. I realize that graduate school is usually more expensive than getting a bachelors degree, but I still think you have the option to work through it, apply for tons of scholarships, ask your employer if they will pay for it etc. I would also look into getting a job that counts as a credit towards your degree. My husband works with troubled youth and it counts as a credit towards his degree in education- so check it out! He also works the night shift which allows him to take classes online while he is at work.

The point is, if you don't have money to pay for it now, how do you know you'll have money to pay for it in the future? Debt, may be accepted in our society, but that doesn't mean there's no other way to do it.

I have a lot of student debt from graduate school that I am paying off slowly. (My parents funded my undergraduate degree.) Unless I have some unexpected good fortune, I will be slowly paying off these loans for the next few decades.

You are correct that this is not necessarily a bad thing. If the degree is of true value to me, a few hundred dollars per month for a few decades would be a worthwhile expenditure. But it's important to understand it at that level. A lot of people, I suspect, go into graduate programs merely because it's "something to do," or a general sense that it's hard to hack it out there with just a Bachelor's Degree. This is kind of careless, in my opinion.

Just remember that these loans are real money. Consider what you would do if a bank just loaned you $30,000 or $40,000 to do anything you pleased. Would you use that money to go to school? Or would you start a business? Travel somewhere? Write a novel? Make a film? If you can think of a whole bunch of things you'd do with that money (okay, productive things...a trip to Vegas doesn't count...), maybe you should put grad school plans aside for now and do some of that stuff. It's probably cheaper.