Final Essay

Joshua Finley

Monique Williams

English 1A

22 December 2013

Student Loans and Higher Education

            Have you thought about attending college but realized you can’t afford it? well, neither can anyone else, we are stuck in the poverty class and the way education is now the dollar signs keep going up and loans keep stacking interest. The book The Rich and The Rest of Us by Tavis Smiley and Cornel West is about poverty in America and how it affects different areas of our country. Its focus has a lot to do about education and how the future of our nation depends on the twenty first century, but is restricted because of the poverty level we are in. Higher education is very important to this century because it defines our future. The lifetime commitment on student loans drives students away from attending college.

            The interest that builds on to student loans will eventually destroy their credit and they will never pay it back. Going to college is something people see as a life goal or accomplishment. As we finish high school we are molded into finding our path or what we call a career to reach successfully. Nowadays for us as a middle class we are stuck in poverty and college isn’t in the picture due to the cost required to attend college. It is impossible to pay for school unless you are a part of the one percent; which is the rich people, or take out loans you will be paying off the majority of your life. “Something is profoundly wrong in America when the younger you are, the more likely you are to be poor” (Smiley, West 56). This is relevant to how; us as the middle class are labeled with a debt before we can even manage our own money. Students are like ATMs to the loan companies because they will keep pulling money out from us as long as they can. If we take student loans out to pay for school the interest on loans will get bigger and will be not payable.

            The amount of money it cost to go to school discourages people from attempting an opportunity at a higher education. When you look at the rich or the wealthy, you see all the luxuries they have and the nice big time schools they attended because they have the money to pay for all of it. As we see the middle class under poverty and not able to pay for higher education it shows that the education system isn’t functioning properly. In order to be successful in this country it seems you have to be born rich; kids that want to attend college don’t do so because they don’t qualify for grants or just can’t afford the tuition. “Odds are, a poor child today will wind up being a poor adult” (Smiley, West 185). So we are projected that being poor as a child in the twenty first century means that you grow in the same poverty level. As we are supposed to be the future of our country we really have nothing to look forward to if we have to pay for our education.

            There should be no fees for higher education as long as we maintain passing grades. Public schools; K-12^th are funded majority by how many students attend the school. Some schools are funded more and some less depending on the area. As we complete high school and are given a diploma of completion are focus is to go to college and further are goals and career. College today is a barrier for students which affects are poverty level because we don’t have a chance to get out of it. “The greatest threat to America’s national security comes from no enemy without but from our own failure to protect, invest in, and educate all of our children who make up all of our futures”(Smiley, West 49). In high school we received grades on how we did in the class, if we failed we would have to retake it in order to move on. College should be looked at the same way based on grades. People should be able to attend college with no charge as long as they maintain a passing grade point average. As our government says that education is important then we should get the chance to change the future.

            Overall we tend to not notice how important school really is because we are forced to look the other way due to the cost. The amount of money it takes to finish college is the amount you can put down on a house, thinking of it that way is discouraging feeling living in the poverty level. Also the loans that are available pretty much make you sign a lifelong contract because the interest on them are continuously increasing, and will take longer to pay off then you actually attended school. Higher education should be free, as long as a qualified grade point average is reached by each student.