But the News4 I-Team found most of those students likely have no idea exactly what their education will cost them, because – according to a study by government researchers – the majority of colleges aren’t transparent about the true cost of attending.

According to a November 2022 report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office, an estimated 91% of American colleges fail to tell students the full cost of their college education.

“Students and their families deserve to know that price,” said Melissa Emrey-Arras, who heads up the GAO team that examined more than 500 aid offers from nearly 200 colleges across the country. “It took quite a while for our own staff to decipher them, and these are people that are trained looking at these. It was still very difficult to figure out what the cost was.”

The GAO, which did not name any of the colleges it examined in its report, found 41% of the offers it examined did not estimate the net price of attending and about half understate the net price by excluding costs such as living expenses and books.

It also found roughly 75% refer to aid as “awards,” which the GAO slammed as confusing as aid packages with loans will need to be repaid.

Emrey-Arras said federal higher aid officials created and recommend ten best practices to make these financial aid offers more transparent, but “colleges are choosing not to follow them.” 

Asked why, Emrey-Arras said, “We heard from people during our work that they have an incentive to not tell people what the full cost is, because if they do so, it will make their school look more expensive.”

Though the U.S. Department of Education created a financial aid offer roadmap for colleges, federal law doesn’t standardize how colleges must present their financial offers to students.

The GAO, which serves as the spending watchdog for lawmakers, has recommended Congress fix that, though legislation to increase transparency in those offers has so far stalled on the Hill.

Justin Draeger, the president of the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators, told the I-Team that while “we can’t make any excuses for schools that are purposefully trying to hide or disguise their costs,” the majority are doing the best they can.

Draeger said, in most cases, confusion on these offers isn’t intentional.

“Paying for college is a really complicated issue in this country …  There are just so many entities involved in helping students and families pay for college,” he said, explaining financial aid officers are trying to organize information from government entities, scholarship providers and families.

“The financial aid office is trying to put together a single package with all of these funding … and it’s really complicated. And I sympathize with students and families who are trying to figure all of this out,” he said.

Draeger welcomed some congressional action on the issue, noting lawmakers could mandate minimal standards on financial offers to make the bottom line easier to understand.

“But I also don’t think that’s going to be a panacea,” he said. “This is going to take all stakeholders coming together and trying to figure this out because the complexities aren’t going to end today or tomorrow.”

The transparency matters more than ever. The Education Data Initiative reports the average four-year college now costs about $35,500, including the cost of books, supplies and living expenses. The EDI reports that average cost has more than doubled in the 21^st century.

The same group reports the average federal student loan debt is about $37,000, and students in the District, Maryland and Virginia have some of the highest average debt loads in the nation.

“Have we done enough? No,” U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) said in an interview with the I-Team about college cost transparency.

Kaine, who sits on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, supports efforts to expand loan forgiveness for public sector employees, increase the Pell grant for low-income students and make it available for job-training programs. He’s also behind bipartisan legislation that would require colleges to provide more in-depth information about student outcomes, such as graduation rates or post-college earnings. So far, however, none has passed.

“We’ve done a lot of different things, but sometimes it’s one step forward, two steps back,” he said.

Kaine said he’s hopeful Congress will eventually tackle an overhaul of the 1965 Higher Education Act – a behemoth bill which he said could address many of these issues – though it hasn’t been reauthorized since 2008.

“The Higher Ed Act gives us the opportunity to look at it comprehensively, and it is my hope on the committee that we will tackle that. It’s long overdue,” he said.

Until then, families like Christine Collins’ are doing their best to prepare for the college bills headed their way.

Collins’ daughter, Taylor, who recently graduated from Magruder High School in Montgomery County, is planning to study neuroscience at the University of Colorado at Boulder this fall.

Collins said that, while her family expects annual costs will exceed $30,000 for out-of-state students like Taylor, “We don’t know really the actual bottom line as of yet.”

The Maryland mother isn’t convinced Congress should determine how schools prepare financial offers, but agreed more should be done to make it easier for parents and students to understand the bottom line.

“I think in all areas of higher education … it should be a more transparent process,” she said.

This story was reported by Ted Oberg, produced by Katie Leslie, and shot and edited by Jeff Piper. NBC Boston contributed to this report.

It might seem tempting to just keep not making payments, but the consequences can be severe, including a hit to your credit score and exclusion from future aid and benefits.

More than 40 million Americans will have to start making federal student loan payments again at the end of the summer under the terms of a debt ceiling deal approved by Congress.

Millions are also waiting to find out whether the Supreme Court will allow President Joe Biden’s student loan forgiveness plan to go ahead. But payments will resume regardless of what justices decide.

That means tough decisions for many borrowers, especially those in already-difficult financial situations.

Experts say that delinquency and bankruptcy should be options of last resort, and that deferment and forbearance — which pause payments, though interest may continue to accrue — are often better in the short term.

WHAT HAPPENS IF I DON’T MAKE STUDENT LOAN PAYMENTS?

Once the moratorium ends, borrowers who can’t or don’t pay risk delinquency and eventually default. That can badly hurt your credit rating and make you ineligible for additional aid and government benefits.

If you’re struggling to pay, advisers first encourage you to check if you qualify for an income-driven repayment plan, which determines your payments by looking at your expenses. You can determine this by visiting the Federal Student Aid website. If you’ve worked for a government agency or a non-profit organization, you could also be eligible for the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program, which forgives student debt after 10 years.

Carolina Rodriguez, Director of the Education Debt Consumer Assistance Program at the Community Service Society of New York, emphasizes that anyone temporarily unemployed should be able to qualify for a $0 payment plan. And many others qualify based on income and family size.

“The repercussions of falling into delinquency can be pretty severe,” Rodriguez said. “The federal government can administratively intercept tax refunds and garnish wages. And it can affect Social Security, retirement, and disability benefits. Does it make financial sense at that point? Probably not.”

Rodriguez says her organization always advises against deferment or forbearance except once a borrower has exhausted all other options. In the long term, those financial choices offer little benefit, as some loans will continue to accrue interest while deferred.

Abby Shafroth, senior attorney and director of the Student Loan Borrower Assistance Project at the National Consumer Law Center, said that, of the two, deferment is generally a better option.

That’s because interest generally does not accrue on Direct Subsidized Loans, the subsidized portion of Direct Consolidation Loans, Subsidized Federal Stafford Loans, the subsidized portion of FFEL Consolidation Loans, and Federal Perkins Loans. All other federal student loans that are deferred will continue to accrue interest.

“Forbearance allows you to postpone payments without it being held against you, but interest does accrue. So you’re going to see your balance increase every month.”

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CAN I FILE BANKRUPTCY ON STUDENT LOANS?

For most student loan borrowers, it’s still very difficult to have your loans discharged, or canceled, through bankruptcy. Borrowers must prove a very hard standard of financial circumstances, called “undue hardship.”

“That doesn’t mean people shouldn’t look into it,” Rodriguez said. “But they may not be successful at discharging their loans.”

For borrowers who show that level of financial strain, chances are they have other options, Rodriguez said.

She advises that borrowers make sure they are speaking to a bankruptcy attorney who understands student loan bankruptcy, which requires a different proceeding than other types of bankruptcy.

Shafroth, of the NCLC, says that new guidance on student loan bankruptcy has been coming out in recent years.

“Though it is difficult to get your loans discharged through the bankruptcy process, an increasing number of borrowers are eligible to get their loans discharged that way,” she said. “A lot of people write that off as ‘there’s no way,’ it’s impossible.’ But it’s increasingly possible.”

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN A LOAN GOES INTO DEFAULT?

When you fall behind on a loan by 270 days — roughly 9 months — the loan appears on your credit report as being in default.

“At that point, it’s not just behind, it’s in collections,” Shafroth said. “That’s when you become ineligible to take out new federal student aid. A lot of people go into default because they weren’t able to complete their degree the first time. This prevents them from going back to school.”

Once a loan is in default, it’s subject to the collection processes mentioned above. That means the government can garnish wages (without a court order) to go towards paying back the loan, intercept tax refunds, and seize portions of Social Security checks and other benefit payments.

WHAT ARE OTHER OPTIONS IF I CAN’T MAKE PAYMENTS?

Shafroth said that many borrowers may still be eligible to have loans canceled via a patchwork of programs outside of the Biden administration’s proposed debt relief program.

“If your school closed before you could complete your program, you’re eligible for relief. If your school lied to you or misrepresented the outcome of what your enrolling would be, you can file a borrower defense application, and request your loan be canceled on that basis,” she said. “If you have a disability, you can sometimes have your loans canceled on that basis.”

Shafroth encourages borrowers to look at the Student Aid website to see what their options might be before missing payments.

WHAT IF MY LOANS WERE IN DEFAULT BEFORE MARCH 2020?

Under the Biden administration’s Fresh Start program, borrowers with federal student loans who were in default before the pause have a chance to become current.

Borrowers who were in default will not be subject to collection processes or have wages garnished through about August 2024, or roughly one year after the payment freeze ends. These borrowers have also been granted permission to apply for federal student loans again, to complete degrees. Lastly, these defaulted loans are now being reported to credit bureaus as current.

That said, borrowers must take action if they want to stay out of default after this year-long leniency period ends.

To eliminate your record of default, you should contact the Education Department’s Default Resolution Group online, by phone, or by mail, and ask the group to take the loans out of default via the Fresh Start policy. In four to six weeks, any record of default will be removed from your credit report, and the loans will be placed with a loan servicer. This will also give you access to income-driven repayment plans and Public Service Loan Forgiveness, if applicable.

WHAT IF I WAS BEHIND ON PAYMENTS OR DELINQUENT BEFORE MARCH 2020?

The Fresh Start program also applies to borrowers who were delinquent prior to the payment pause. Those accounts will be considered current, and borrowers will have the option to enroll in income-driven repayment plans that can lower bills to as little as $0, or to apply for deferment, forbearance or bankruptcy.

Ireland, Smith and Kala Shute have been almost inseparable for the last 21 years. Now, they’ll be graduating together with honors from USC after a journey that required hard work, perseverance and teamwork.

“I think, especially after losing somebody who’s so foundational in your life, that a lot of people often turn to negative behaviors. And I think that for us, we really kind of stuck to what our mom ingrained in us: try our best, do what we love,” Kala Shute told NBC4.

The three already graduated together from La Cañada High School and, except for a short period during the COVID pandemic, have always been in the same zip code.

The journey to graduating from USC with them all in sync has been nothing short of extraordinary.

The trio lost their mom to cancer when they were only 15. A single mom who they say worked 80 hours a week to provide, from her they learned hard work and perseverance.

“She was an incredibly hard worker. She had three jobs and she sacrificed a lot of her personal time to make sure we had everything that we could ever dream of, and we really wouldn’t be here without that foundation that she set for us,” Ireland Shute said.

But they have other people to thank, as well. After their mom died, the triplets were originally going to go live out of state with an aunt. However, their community didn’t want to see them go.

After word spread that the siblings were leaving, one of Smith’s friends since middle school, Trevor Lee, told his parents, Joe and Christine Lee. The pair, who already had two children of their own, offered the three and their older brother the opportunity to stay at their house, at least until they graduated high school.

Despite the “tight smush,” the couple did everything in their power to give the triplets everything they needed to succeed. Then, in 2019, they officially adopted them.

“I think they, in many ways, saved our lives and they changed the trajectory of our entire life forever. And I don’t know where we would be otherwise,” Smith Shute said.

After graduating, they will be only the latest in their family to call themselves USC alumni. A brother and sister of theirs graduated from the school ahead of them. Another brother and two other family members are also currently Trojans and may follow in their footsteps.

But their motivation continues to be their mother, who graduated from USC in 1997.

“We overachieved our way here and we’re all going to graduate together, and I’d like to think that she’d be proud of that,” Smith Shute said.

Irene Piscopo Rodgers, class of 1959, sent in her first $50 donation decades ago. Her giving grew over the years, as did her prominence in science and technology.

When she died last summer, the university learned her estate was donating $30 million – by far the biggest gift to the school.

“She has often said, it’s a quote that we’ve used and we’ve heard, that Mary Washington opened up worlds for her, and she wanted to be able to pay that forward to our students so it could open up worlds of opportunity for them, as well,” said Katie Turcotte of UMW.

The gift comes with very specific instructions: The money must go directly to students for scholarships, research projects and study abroad.

For senior Megan Carr, it’s meant a full-ride scholarship and study in the Galápagos Islands. She’s doing the kind of sophisticated research many undergraduate students can’t dream: examining plastics residue in fish.

Piscopo Rodgers didn’t just write checks to the school; she got to know and mentor young scientists. 

“I think it’s been very motivating having such a prominent woman in STEM stand behind me and help me pursue my goals in STEM, so it’s definitely been a motivating factor for me to stay on my path,” Carr said. 

Ryan Meeks, who hopes to pursue a career as a doctor, also credits Piscopo Rodgers with inspiring him. 

“It’s been a huge deal to me coming into undergrad … being able to utilize that equipment and be exposed to that so early on was really impactful in my experience as an undergrad,” he said. 

University officials believe the gift may be the biggest single gift ever in this country specifically for undergraduate student research in the sciences.

Students and professors at the university in Arlington, Virginia, told News4 they believe cutting those majors would be a mistake. The school is considering getting rid of nine liberal arts majors such as theology, philosophy, math, art and history.

“They offer people a chance to really delve deeply into issues and think critically about a variety of issues in the world,” English professor Holly Karapetkova said.

“We all know that the diversity of thought on campus is really important, and that these programs really make our students better students,” biology professor Susan Agolini said.

Marymount is not the only college experiencing this. The number of liberal arts and sciences majors at four-year universities has been dropping since 2017. During the pandemic, several colleges announced cuts to their programs due to declining enrollment.

“It would be irresponsible to sustain majors and programs with consistently low enrollment, low graduation rates and lack of potential for growth,” Marymount wrote on an internal campus website viewed by News4.

Ariane Economos, director of Marymount’s School of Humanities, said she doesn’t agree with the low enrollment information.

“These programs have graduation rates that are in line with all the other programs in the university, so we’re hearing what I think is misinformation,” Economos said.

Marymount liberal studies alumnus Mike De Robbio said he loved his courses.

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“They have made an indelible impact on my life,” De Robbio said. “Eliminating those just makes you not equipped for the 21st century.”

In an email to News4, Marymount said the proposed cuts aim to “better position the university for long-term growth and success” and they feel it’s their responsibility to prepare students for highly sought-after jobs. Students currently enrolled in the affected programs will still be able to graduate and humanities classes will remain part of the core curriculum, according to the university.

The board of trustees is set to vote on the cuts this week, and students are planning a protest sit-in on Friday, faculty members said. A petition on Change.org to “Save the Humanities Majors” also has over 1,500 signatures.

In fact, despite looming concerns of a recession, New York and California were ranked the top two states for college graduates to start their careers, according to a recent study from BestColleges.com, a student resource website.

“While New York and California’s sky-high rents and pricey living expenses may be deterrents for those just starting out on their own after college, there are many reasons to move to these states, especially beyond their popular cities,” said Jessica Bryant, an analyst for BestColleges, in a statement.

BestColleges ranked all 50 states on nine metrics, based on publicly available data, including average rent price, cost of living, average entry-level salary, number of job openings, racial/ethnic diversity and level of fun. These metrics were also weighed by level of importance.

Based on the findings, these are the top 10 best states to start your career:

1. New York
2. California
3. Illinois
4. Texas
5. Colorado
6. Virginia
7. Washington
8. Michigan
9. Oklahoma
10. Maryland

New York is known for its historic landmarks, performing arts and vibrant nightlife, making it unsurprising that young people would enjoy living there post-graduation. In addition to these perks, those starting careers in New York can anticipate higher entry-level salaries, more job openings and increased diversity across variables like ethnicity, age and gender, BestColleges reports.

Similarly, California also ranked highly for its large number of jobs and diversity, in addition to equitable opportunities for women and access to higher education. The Golden State lost points for its average rent price and cost of living, which is 4.3% higher than New York. In San Jose, California, for example, the average worker would have to work 77.4 hours to pay a median monthly rent of $2,232.

Illinois was praised for having the lowest cost of living for all states in the top five, while Texas had better rankings for overall fun. Colorado was ranked highly for equitable opportunities for women but fell flat in areas like cost of living.

BestColleges also advises recent graduates to consider other factors not mentioned in their study when deciding where to start a career.

“Variables like political climate, crime and safety, and weather can all play an important role in your decision to move somewhere new.”

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The U.S. Department of Education has agreed to cancel the student loans of around 200,000 people who brought a class action lawsuit against the government, claiming they were stuck with federal debts from schools that were found to have misled them.

Under the terms of the Sweet v. Cardona settlement, the Education Department will immediately approve around $6 billion in debt forgiveness. The 200,000 borrowers eligible for the relief will get full cancellation of their debt, refunds of amounts paid and repair to their credit.

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The plaintiffs brought their lawsuit against the Trump administration in 2019, representing around 264,000 class members who said their applications for loan cancellation were being ignored by the Education Department. (The suit name was later changed from Sweet v. DeVos to Sweet v. Cardona after current U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona replaced former Trump appointee Betsy DeVos.)

“This momentous proposed settlement will deliver answers and certainty to borrowers who have fought long and hard for a fair resolution of their borrower defense claims after being cheated by their schools and ignored or even rejected by their government,” said Eileen Connor, director of the Project on Predatory Student Lending at Harvard Law School.

The Project compiled a list of the dozens of schools that are involved in the settlement and that the Education Department has determined engaged in misconduct.

“Since day one, the Biden-Harris Administration has worked to address longstanding issues relating to the borrower defense process,” Secretary Cardona said in a statement.

“We are pleased to have worked with plaintiffs to reach an agreement that will deliver billions of dollars of automatic relief to approximately 200,000 borrowers and that we believe will resolve plaintiffs’ claims in a manner that is fair and equitable for all parties.”

Miranda Kerr and Evan Spiegel made the largest single gift in Otis College of Art and Design’s history to help the 2022 graduates pay back their student loans. The announcement was made during the school’s commencement ceremony on May 15.

“We know that for most of you and your families the shared burden of student debt is a heavy price that you paid for an exceptional Otis College education,” Charles Hirschhorn, president of the L.A.-based school, said.

“We understand that this debt can compromise your future and limit your creative ambitions. We do not want to see this happen. We want to empower your imagination, your creativity and innovation…. You have the support of the entire Otis community as well as Miranda and Evan. So, we are pleased to announce today that Evan and Miranda, through their Spiegel Family Fund, have made the largest single gift in the history of Otis college. Their gift will enable you to repay your student loans.”

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As Hirschhorn explained, the donation allowed the school to create a fund that will “cover full repayment” of the class of 2022’s “existing, outstanding student debt for loans certified by the college.” Furthermore, he continued, a second fund has been established to “reduce comparable student debt that has not been certified by the college.”

“We look forward to great success all of you will achieve in the years ahead,” Hirschhorn said, “and we hope this gift enables you to do great things and to pay it forward and do great things for others.”

After hearing the news, the class of 2022, which according to the Los Angeles Times consists of 285 graduates, broke out into tears and applause.

“People are crying,” Hirschhorn said after choking up. “It’s making me cry.”

Kerr and Spiegel, who tied the knot in 2017, received honorary doctorates along with Queer Eye star Bobby Berk. During his speech, Snap CEO Spiegel recalled how he took classes at Otis College when he was 15, enrolling in graphic design and drawing courses.

“Otis changed my life and it made me feel at home,” he said. “In class, I felt seen for my work, even when the critiques were tough as they often were. I felt pushed and challenged to grow, surrounded by super talented artists and designers and we were all in it together. And that was just the high school summer program. You all have made it through the real deal. You’re graduating from college.”

In her speech, Kerr talked about being “blown away” after a tour of the class of 2022’s final projects.

“Our 11-year-old [Flynn], who’s also an artist, came home after the tour ignited and inspired by your creativity and is super excited about signing up for some summer classes,” the supermodel said about her son with ex-husband Orlando Bloom (She and Spiegel have two kids: Hart, 4, and Myles, 2). “He’s here today. Hi, Flynn!”

After the ceremony, Berk reacted to Kerr and Spiegel’s gift. “What a beautiful moment watching the faces of those students and families as it sunk in that they are not only walking away with a degree that they worked so hard to get, but also walking away debt free,” he wrote on Instagram. “Well done Evan and Miranda, we’ll done!”

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A goodbye note posted to the school’s website said that it survived both World Wars, the Spanish flu and the Great Depression, but was unable to handle the combination of the Covid pandemic and a severe ransomware attack in December that took months to remedy.

“Lincoln College was a victim of a cyberattack in December 2021 that thwarted admissions activities and hindered access to all institutional data, creating an unclear picture of Fall 2022 enrollment projections,” the school wrote in its announcement. “All systems required for recruitment, retention, and fundraising efforts were inoperable. Fortunately, no personal identifying information was exposed. Once fully restored in March 2022, the projections displayed significant enrollment shortfalls, requiring a transformational donation or partnership to sustain Lincoln College beyond the current semester.”

The Illinois school, which is named after President Abraham Lincoln and broke ground on his birthday in 1865, is one of only a handful of rural American colleges that qualify as predominantly Black institutions by the Department of Education.

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Elliott Tanner is maintaining a 3.78 grade point average at the University of Minnesota and is participating in undergraduate research while also tutoring classmates. He wants to be high-energy theoretical physicist and ultimately a professor of physics at the university.

“I have an incredible passion for physics,” he said. “It’s been one of my favorite things to do.”

Elliott’s mom, Michelle Tanner, said he started reading and doing math by age 3. Following a few years of homeschooling and a high school curriculum that took him two years to complete, he began taking college classes when he was 9.

“People who hear Elliott’s story say he doesn’t get to be a kid, or he grew up too fast,” Michelle said. “He still very much is a kid and the only difference is he goes to school in a different building.”

Besides being on the verge of graduating, he has been accepted into the University of Minnesota’s Physics PhD program. Now his parents are trying to figure out how to pay for it.

“We’re just trying to explore all our options, and coming up with dead ends,” Michelle said. “Trying to apply for any scholarships, fellowships, grants, and we have not been successful.”

“I didn’t want to give up, but it could have come to the point that I couldn’t afford school,” said Carla Osborn, 31, from Portales, New Mexico.

Osborn is studying nursing at Clovis Community College, located in a very small town near New Mexico’s border with Texas. Her husband, Brendon, works as a probation officer, but together they are already paying off his student loans and money is tight.  

Osborn says she and her husband don’t need any more debt, and she credits New Mexico’s Opportunity Scholarship, which covers full tuition and books, for providing a pathway to her degree.

“I was praying and hoping I would get help somehow and it just kind of worked out,” she said.

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Even though the Biden administration’s plan to make community college tuition-free for two years was stripped from the federal Build Back Better bill, the push for free college is alive and well in many parts of the country.  

While the White House has turned its focus to extending the student loan payment pause, states have been quietly moving forward with plans to pass legislation of their own to make some college tuition-free.

Most recently, New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, a Democrat, signed the New Mexico Opportunity Scholarship Act, establishing the most extensive tuition-free scholarship program in the country.

Like New York’s Excelsior Scholarship, it covers four years of tuition, including career training certificates, associate and bachelor’s degrees.

But New Mexico’s Opportunity Scholarship goes a step further by opening up access to returning adult learners, part-time students and immigrants, regardless of their immigration status, in addition to recent high school graduates. (The average age of a college student in New Mexico is 26.)

“We want to be the national example of how you create a higher education ecosystem system that’s inclusive and accessible,” Higher Education Department Secretary Stephanie Rodriguez said. “So nobody is turned away from the opportunity to go to college.”

Maine’s Gov. Janet Mills, also a Democrat, has proposed a plan to make two years of community college free for recent high school graduates.

If passed, that would bring the total number of statewide free-college programs to 30, which means 60% of states would have free tuition opportunities.

“If we get to 50, it’s mission accomplished,” said Morley Winograd, president and CEO of the Campaign for Free College Tuition.

Most are “last-dollar” scholarships, meaning students receive a scholarship for the amount of tuition that is not covered by existing state or federal aid. (President Joe Biden recently asked Congress for a $2,175 hike in maximum Pell grants for college students as part of his budget proposal, which would significantly increase the amount of money provided by the federal government, effectively lowering the cost for states to implement free college programs.)

In New Mexico, the state aid is applied first, so federal aid and private scholarships can go toward books, room and board and childcare to help cover the total cost of going to school. 

Even though college enrollment has slid since the beginning of the pandemic, students still want to get a degree, and the sky-high costs often stand in the way, research shows.

The number of undergraduates in college is now down 5.1% compared to two years ago — a loss of nearly 1 million students, according to a report by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center — with the schools serving low- and middle-income students seeing the largest declines.

However, high schoolers are much more likely to go to college if they believe their families can afford it, according to a study of more than 23,000 students by the National Center for Education Statistics.

“If you want people to enroll, tell them it’s free,” Winograd said.

Not all experts agree that free college is the best way to combat the college affordability crisis.

Critics say lower-income students, through a combination of existing grants and scholarships, already pay little in tuition to state schools, if anything at all.

Further, in most cases the money does not cover fees, books, or room and board, which are all costs that lower-income students struggle with, and diverting funds toward free tuition could come at the expense of other operations on campus, including hiring and retaining faculty and administrators.

In addition, community college is already significantly less expensive. At two-year public schools, tuition and fees averages $3,800 for the 2021-22 school year, according to the College Board. Alternatively, at four-year, in-state public schools, that number is $10,740 and, at four-year private universities, it’s $38,070.

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College is a time when you learn so many new things so quickly — you’re learning about your major and future career, meeting people from around the world and learning how to live independently. But one area that is sorely lacking for most college students: learning about money. 

Nearly half of college students say they do not feel prepared to manage their own money and more than half said they worry if they’ll have enough to last through the semester, according to data from Everfi. 

This was true for Alillia Clements, a 23-year old Stanford University graduate, senior financial analyst at Microsoft and the creator of Gen Z adulting and finance Instagram and TikTok accounts, @financialilliasecure. In spite of her affinity for math and numbers and experience taking economic courses as a public policy major, Clements felt that money management and financial literacy were inaccessible to her. 

“It was me doing an internship over the summer, making money from that, and trying to figure out how it’s going to work for the rest of the school year,” she said. 

And her trouble with managing money in college would later show up when she secured her first postgraduate offer amid the pandemic.

“My first two months of working … I was just like: ‘I’ll order DoorDash. It doesn’t matter. I live at home, I’m saving money,’ or … ‘I’ll go to New York next week,'” Clements said. “[W]ithout the proper systems in place, it didn’t matter that I was living at home, it didn’t matter that I was making six figures because, if I’m not keeping that money, it’s for not.”

So, if overspending can happen to someone who is a self-proclaimed math and numbers person, it can certainly happen to the rest of us! And it does.

A lot of college students may think that because they don’t have a lot of money, they don’t need to learn about money. That couldn’t be further from the truth. College is the BEST time to learn about money and start building smart habits around making, spending, saving and investing your money.

“College is the best time to develop healthy financial habits that you’ll need later in life because you are completely vulnerable in the world as a young adult. The earlier you get in control of your money the better,” said Dasha Kennedy, a financial activist and the creator of an international financial literacy online community that serves over 80,000 African-American women.

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On the surface, building a budget seems to be intimidating, but it really doesn’t have to be complicated. You don’t have to spend hours or have elaborate spreadsheets. You just have to take a few simple steps and build good habits.

Step 1: Know your numbers

First step, take an inventory of your key numbers. Those are:

• monthly income
• fixed expenses
• variable expenses
• savings

Monthly income is what you bring in on a recurring basis from jobs, internships, financial aid and family support. Remember: This is what you get in your paycheck after taxes (not what the job or internship offer is and not your hourly rate).

Fixed expenses are things you need to pay for that typically cost the same amount, such as your rent or phone bill.

Variable expenses are necessities and wants where the prices and frequency vary, such as groceries, transportation or entertainment.

Savings. You can’t just spend everything you make; you have to keep some left over in your checking account for any expenses that come up and then save some for longer-term goals like getting your first apartment.

Now do a quick calculation:

Monthly income – fixed expenses = $___.

What’s left over, you can use for spending on things you want but don’t need. But, you also have to save some.

If you have almost zero money left over right now, don’t beat yourself up. Just recognize that this is what is right now and let’s dig in and start making some adjustments. You would be surprised how easy it is, with a few adjustments, to start saving!

Step 2: Set up a budget

Setting up a budget is as simple as figuring out — based on what you earn and what your fixed expenses are — what you can afford to spend on extra things and how much you’ll put in savings.

One common approach to setting up a budget that works for a lot of people is following the 50-30-20 rule.

That means, 50% of your money goes toward your needs (rent, utilities, groceries, etc.), 30% goes towards your wants (eating out, shopping, entertainment, etc.) and 20% goes into savings.

Although this isn’t the only way to budget, it’s a great place to start because it’s three simple numbers. Should you find that the rule doesn’t work for you, you can always make adjustments later. You’re not locked in.

“I think it’s important to start having [a budget] because you never want to not be able to pay the rent,” said Nan J. Morrison, the president and CEO of the Council for Economic Education.

If you can’t afford to save 20%, set a fixed amount that you can save each month. Then, the next time you’re checking in on your finances to see where you’re at, see if you can increase your savings — even a little bit — until it’s at least 20%. What’s important is that you start saving now.

Step 3: Track your budget

You’ve got to figure out your own budgeting style, whether that’s writing it down with a pen and paper, setting up a spreadsheet on your computer or using a personal finance app.

Those who prefer to write their information out to better retain it can use the following worksheet to develop their new budget. Whether you want to print it or type it out, this method is good for understanding exactly where your money is going.

“I think one thing that’s super handy is a pen and a piece of paper or a spreadsheet because you can just kind of write down, ‘What’s my income?’… It doesn’t have to be in a lot of detail, but  ‘What are the things I need to spend money on or that I want to spend money on?’… and just kind of  write down those things you like to do on a regular basis and one or two things you might be saving for,” Morrison explained.

For those who may not enjoy the process of having to write everything out — Don’t worry! Online resources such as the Mint Budget Planner and Tracker and digital tools offered by your bank or other financial institution, plus automating things like bill pay and savings, can aid you in developing a budget that you can easily and consistently stick to.

“It [automation] plays a huge factor in easing the stress of budgeting because it does all of the heavy lifting for you. Once you’ve connected your bank account, a budget app will pick up on different spending trends you didn’t even know you had. Automation also makes it easier to save and manage money without thinking about it,” Kennedy said.

Step 4: Find ways to cut back your spending

Once you realize how much you earn, how much you spend and build a system to properly track these items, it’s important to set saving goals and cut back on excessive spending.

College students spend a lot of money on essentials like rent, course materials, groceries and transportation, plus extra expenditures like food, clothes, entertainment and going out. Understanding where you can spend less money will better help you budget and save.

“I have this habit … of seeing a price tag and just throwing my money at it,” said Galaxy Okoro, a 23-year-old senior at Howard University. “I really had to teach myself … So, I decided … I’m going to get a savings account, and I’m going to start putting my checks towards my savings … so, I kind of budget out how much money I take at a time.”

Okoro has found ways to cut back spending on her course materials as a health science major.

“I like to look for deals,” Okoro said. “So, before I make a large purchase, I’m gonna make sure [that] I go on all the websites: ‘Is it cheaper here?'”

“I had to take first aid this semester, and our teacher recommended that first aid training kit, and it was like $30 … This training kit only has one set of tools, and I can’t really use it after that,” Okoro explained. “So, I was just like, ‘OK, I’m gonna go on Amazon,’ and I found a $9 first aid kit … I just saved, like, $20!”

Now, this isn’t to say just because you started budgeting you have to cut out all your spending – and fun. It just means be aware of how much you’re spending and where, figure out where you can make cutbacks and try to save where you can.

Do you need to buy a latte every day on the way to class? Probably not. But, if it’s really important to you, then do it! But, then take a look at your budget and figure out other areas where you can cut your spending. It’s all about priorities: Prioritize the things that are important to you and cut back on the things that aren’t.

Step 5: Separate your checking and savings accounts

Saving is a two-pronged process: You need money that’s accessible short-term for your everyday expenses and unexpected expenses that come up. Plus, you need to put some in savings that you won’t touch for a long time.

“It’s all about balance,” Morrison said.

Checking account. You should keep some money in your checking account — don’t take it down to or close to zero. You will run the risk of overdrafting your account (taking out more than you have in there) and then you’ll get slapped with a fee. That could be $25 or more. And, you never know when you’ll have an unexpected expense, so you want cash handy to be able to cover it.

Savings account. You should set up an automatic amount to go to a savings account every month. It doesn’t have to be a large amount if you don’t have a lot of money, like most college students. But, if you automate it and get used to a little money being swept off to savings every month, you’ll never miss it. You want that money somewhere where it can grow and make more money. And, the earlier you start, the more money you’ll have. Simple as that!

“Separating your income by a checking and savings account is the easiest way to protect yourself from yourself,” Kennedy said. “I would even suggest going as far as keeping your checking and savings account at different banks because it’s one of the easiest ways to save money and avoid the temptation of overspending or having multiple savings accounts for different reasons.”

Unexpected expenses such as a broken laptop, a flat tire or an illness can happen to anyone. So, you just have to be prepared. Have some cash in your checking account at the end of every month so that when something comes up, you’re not caught off guard.

It’s also important to recognize what future expenses you want to save for. This can range from relocating upon graduating from college (maybe you want to move to New York City or another big city), making student loan payments or preparing for a post-graduation vacation.

All of these things cost money! And racking up credit-card debt isn’t the answer. If you start budgeting now, you won’t get yourself stuck in a cycle of debt later on.

Automation using apps and digital tools from her bank have greatly helped Clements in managing her money. 

“My savings account has different buckets and when it’s automatically pulled out of my paycheck, it’s also automatically distributed to my different goals,” Clements said.

She does this through a feature on her banking app, Ally.

“I usually just have everything done for me through my different tools,” she said.

Step 6: Set up regular check-ins … with yourself

Budgeting, contrary to what you might think, doesn’t require a lot of your time. All you have to do is:

• Decide what your budgeting approach will be (like using the 50-30-20 rule)
• Track your budget — by writing it down, using a spreadsheet or app
• Check in with yourself regularly (weekly, monthly or at the start of each semester) to see if you’re on track and make adjustments if necessary.

That’s it! It’s that simple.

You may want to check in monthly at first, but if you have a spending problem, you may want to check in weekly with how much you’re spending so you’re not in a bind at the end of the month and panicking over how you’re going to pay the rent.

“Find a way to consolidate your spending, make a date with yourself to look at it Sunday night or the first of every month to see where your money is going,” Morrison recommended.

And, you don’t have to do it alone.

“If you have a trusted friend or two, picking a time (or two) a year to talk about goals and investments — and your budget! — can be very helpful. It keeps you accountable,” Morrison explained.

And don’t worry if you’re not always “perfect” in your spending or saving. No one — not even your favorite money guru — is perfect.

The key is to start now: Build good habits and check in with your progress. If you overspent last month, make the correction this month and get back on track. Don’t beat yourself up or worse — keep overspending month after month until the problem snowballs out of control.

Being in control of your money is one of the most important things you will do to set yourself up for long-term financial success.

Here’s what I’ve learned about budgeting

Before I began researching, reporting and writing this article, I’ll admit, I did not have a budget. What held me back from starting was not knowing where to start and believing that because I had limited income and very few expenses, it wasn’t necessary to start.

In the course of writing this article, however, I learned that budgeting is essential to saving and, eventually, building your money.

I learned that all the things it takes to start a budget are already at my fingertips, and it isn’t as hard as I thought!

Believing that just because my income was limited and I had few expenses was a mistake on my part in my financial journey. Now, while in college, is the best time to begin practicing money management.

As the first of the month approaches and I dig into my savings to pay my rent, I will begin to create a budget based on my income, needs and wants — and I’m going to use the 50-30-20 rule.

I need things like groceries and toiletries, but I also want to have money to spend on self-care like massages. And my new annual savings goal is $5,000.

I think the hardest part for me will be consistency and scheduling check-ins. Those require a lot of discipline that I haven’t had in the past with my finances.

Ironically, I’m excited for the challenge. Understanding how beneficial money management and budgeting are, I’m hopeful for what this will do for me post-graduation — which isn’t far off at this point!

“College Money 101” is a guide written by college students to help the class of 2022 learn about big money issues they will face in life — from student loans to budgeting and getting their first apartment — and make smart money decisions. And, even if you’re still in school, you can start using this guide right now so you are financially savvy when you graduate and start your adult life on a great financial track. Darreonna Davis is a third-year journalism student at Howard University and a three-term NBCU intern, working with the CNBC Specials Unit. The guide is edited by Cindy Perman.

SIGN UP: Money 101 is an eight-week learning course to financial freedom, delivered weekly to your inbox. For the Spanish version Dinero 101, click here.

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Disclosure: NBCUniversal and Comcast Ventures are investors in Acorns.

Nowhere in President Joe Biden’s more than 100-page budget for 2023 is any mention of student loan forgiveness or the payment pause for borrowers, continuing the uncertainty millions of Americans have been in about the future of their debt.

The White House only requested more funding — $2.7 billion — to improve customer service for borrowers.

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Yet it’s unclear when people with student loans will have to interact with their servicers again. Most borrowers haven’t made a payment on their debt in more than two years, thanks to a pause on the bills that has been repeatedly extended.

Despite the omission of any information on the payment pause in Biden’s budget, the administration has suggested it was considering delaying the resumption of payments beyond May, when they’re currently slated to resume.

White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain said earlier this month that Biden wanted to make its decision around debt cancellation before turning the payments back on.

"The president is going to look at what we should do on student debt before the pause expires, or he'll extend the pause," Klain said on the podcast "Pod Save America."

The White House would likely only include a request for forgiveness if it planned to ask Congress to implement it, said higher education expert Mark Kantrowitz.

Its omission could suggest the administration was still contemplating cancelling the debt without legislation, either through new regulations or executive action.

Meanwhile, he said, "they do not need to budget for an extension."

Some Democrats and advocates have warned that it would be a disaster to restart payments before the mid-term elections in November.

Research shows borrowers may face significant hurdles come May. One estimate found nearly a third of loan holders could be at a high risk of missing their payments without another extension.

Even before the pandemic, the country's outstanding student loan debt balance exceeded $1.7 trillion and posed a larger burden to households than credit card or auto debt. Average debt at graduation is around $30,000, and roughly a quarter of borrowers, or 10 million people, were estimated to be in delinquency or default.

A recent poll found that nearly 66% of likely voters are in support of Biden canceling some or all of student debt, with more than 70% of Latino and Black voters in favor.

Critics of a student debt jubilee say that it would be unfair to those who didn't borrow for their education or who've paid off their loans and that it wouldn't significantly stimulate the economy because college graduates tend to be higher earners more likely to redirect their monthly bill to savings than additional spending.

As of now, the lack of guidance at this point is frustrating for borrowers and servicers alike, said Scott Buchanan, executive director of the Student Loan Servicing Alliance, a trade group for federal student loan servicers.

"Constantly shifting the repayment date arbitrarily means servicers have been forced to ramp up and ramp down, creating confusion and wasting lots of resources," Buchanan said.

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Certified financial planner Amber Miller is used to thinking about the costs and challenges of life for her clients. It gave her a leg up when it came to preparing for the birth of her own first child last year.

“We had our daughter, Zahra, in August, and we’re still head over heels about it,” said Miller, a senior financial planner with The Planning Center in Minneapolis. “My husband and I had a lot of conversations heading into it, so we felt pretty prepared, but our shopping bill is still double what we expected.”

Money may not be the very first thing young parents think about when they’re expecting a child, but it should be a priority. Children are expensive. In 2015, the U.S. Department of Agriculture estimated the cost of raising a child to the age of 18 — i.e., before college — at $233,610, or $12,978 per year. Adjusted for average inflation of 2.47% since 2015, that’s now $277,108, or $15,395 per year.

For a couple or single parent making more than $100,000 per year, that is not a crushing burden, but it is for a household with $40,000 in income. The three biggest costs identified by the Department of Agriculture were housing costs, at 29%; food, 18%; and child care and education, 16%.

The figure, however, was an average cost and the study found wide variation in child-related spending based on household income. Families with before-tax income of less that $59,200 spent between $9,330 and $9,980 on children while households with more than $107,400 in income spent between $19,380 and $23,380. In other words, new parents will cope with the resources they have.

Zachary Bouck, managing principal of Denver Wealth Management in Greenwood Village, Colorado, always tries to reduce money anxiety for new parents. “The first thing I tell clients expecting babies is that it doesn’t have to be as expensive as they might believe — particularly in the first years,” he said.

Bouck has three children of his own.

“Little kids just don’t need a ton of things,” he said. The bigger issue with babies is how they will impact household income.

“Will one parent stay at home and, if not, what is the daycare situation?” Bouck said. “If you’re making $50,000, the cost of daycare can be shocking.”

Whatever their income levels, all new parents should draft a baby budget. It will help you prepare for and control costs. Miller at The Planning Center suggests thinking about it from two perspectives: the one-time costs in preparation for having a baby and the monthly ongoing costs thereafter.

On the first front, the cost of pre-natal care and delivery can vary widely depending on your health insurance and your health circumstances. If you are adopting a child or require fertility treatment, the costs will be significantly higher.

The monthly costs for bringing up baby include diapers, food, formula, creams, wipes, bottles, toys and clothes, etc. “Make a list with price tags for everything and then pad it by 1.5 times,” suggested Miller. “There are always things you don’t think of.”

Both Miller and Bouck emphasize that parents should take advantage of any available public assistance programs such as the child tax credit, which was recently raised to $3,600 from $2,000 for children under 6 and $3,000 for other children under 18. The full credit is available to couples earning up to $150,000.

Also tap into informal support networks from friends and family to help reduce costs. “People should engage with their community,” Bouck said. “You’re joining a club.

“All of us with kids are welcoming to new parents,” he added. “There’s a hand-me-down culture for things like clothes and toys.”

Also be prepared for costs to rise as your child grows. They will eat more, need more clothes, and want more toys and stuff.

It is also never too early to think about funding college for your child. While contributions to 529 college savings plans are not tax-deductible on a federal basis, they are in many states. What’s more, the earnings in the plans are deductible if they are used for qualified education expenses.

“I talk about 529 plans with new parent clients right away,” Miller said. “It’s important behavior to build early.”

She suggests parents start with small contributions and, when daycare needs end, shift that money into the 529 plan.

Bouck also recommends an early start to college planning, though he advises new parents to pay off personal debt and get their own retirement planning in order first. In Colorado, the state contributes the first $100 to new 529 plans and has a contribution matching program for lower-income parents.

“I started contributing $25 per month because I was paying off student loans,” he said. “It made me feel good.”

Stanford University is considered the ultimate dream school, according to a survey of students and their families.

It’s also one of the hardest to get into and among the nation’s most expensive institutions — tuition and fees, room and board and other student expenses came to more than $73,000 last year.

And therein lies the problem with college.

“This year has been the most competitive year ever,” said Alix Coupet, a former admissions officer at Stanford University and a current lead counselor at college counseling firm Empowerly.

The colleges at the very top of most students’ wish lists are not only highly selective (Stanford’s acceptance rate hit an all-time low just below 4% last year; at Harvard and MIT, the rate was also about 4%) and the sky-high price tags deter some from even applying.

As the pandemic’s economic impact continues to weigh unevenly on the economy, college is becoming a path only for those who can afford it, reports show.

Overall, tuition and fees plus room and board for a four-year private college averaged $55,800 in the 2021-22 school year; at four-year, in-state public colleges, it was $27,330, according to the College Board. 

Nationwide, fewer students went back to school again this year, dragging undergraduate enrollment down another 3.1% from last year, according to a report by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center based on data from colleges.

The number of undergraduates in college is now down 5.1% compared to two years ago — a loss of nearly 1 million students, the report found — with the schools serving low- and middle-income students seeing the largest declines.

At the same time, the students who are applying are casting a wider net, resulting in a record number of applications at many top colleges and historically low acceptance rates as a result.

So far application volume for undergraduate admission has jumped 21% from pre-pandemic levels, according to data from the Common App as of March 15.

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As acceptance letters roll in, students have just a few weeks to figure out their next move ahead of National College Decision Day on May 1, the deadline for high school seniors to choose which college they will attend. 

At that point, they must pay a non-refundable deposit to secure their seat at the school of their choice. 

But the biggest problem remains how they will pay for their degree.

A majority of college-bound students and their parents now say affordability and dealing with the debt burden that often goes hand-in-hand with a college diploma is their top concern, according to The Princeton Review’s 2022 College Hopes & Worries survey.

A whopping 98% of families said financial aid would be necessary to pay for college and 80% said it was “extremely” or “very” necessary, The Princeton Review found.

Stanford was among several institutions that froze tuition during the height of Covid, marking the first year without a tuition increase in more than three decades amid concerns about the pandemic’s impact on students and their families.

However, total undergraduate charges will jump 4% next year to just over $77,000, including $57,692 for tuition, $18,619 for room and board and another $723 as a mandatory health fee.

“Money is an issue,” said Robert Franek, The Princeton Review’s editor-in-chief. “It is intimidating, but you needn’t be bested by it.” 

“Never cross an expensive school off of your list of consideration based on sticker price alone,” Franek added. Consider the amount of aid available, since private schools typically have more money to spend.

“Many of those schools are giving out substantial scholarships — this is free money.”

In fact, Stanford offers generous financial aid for those that qualify. Tuition is covered for undergrads with family incomes under $150,000. 

As a result, just 13% of undergraduates leave Stanford with student debt, owing an average of $13,700, according to the school.

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“It’s not surprising that many students aren’t completely prepared for all the big money decisions that are thrown at them in college like student loans, budgeting, paying the bills, handling credit cards, etc., because let’s face it, most of us don’t talk money at home and didn’t learn it in school,” said Winnie Sun, managing director of Sun Group Wealth Partners in Irvine, California.

Even if no one ever talked to you about money or finance “isn’t your thing,” everyone needs to know about money. You need to know how much you earn. How much you need to pay your bills. How much you have left over to spend. And how much you are saving. Saving may seem like a ridiculous concept when most college students would describe themselves as “broke,” but emergency expenses like a busted laptop or a flat tire can happen to anyone at any time so you need emergency savings to be ready.

You can’t just throw your hands up in the air dramatically and say, “Why does this stuff always happen to me?!” It happens to all of us. You just weren’t ready. You need to be ready. And if no one taught you, it’s up to you to figure it out. But don’t worry, you don’t have to go it alone!

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That’s why we decided to create “College Money 101: The ultimate money guide for college students.” We want to give students a foundation to learn the basics about money, be smart about their money, have enough money to do what they want in life and be prepared for the unexpected expenses life throws at us.

“It’s important for students to know about their money, because it sets the financial foundation for the rest of their adult life,” Sun said. “Those who make better financial decisions early give themselves a better chance at achieving bigger financial goals down the road.” 

Here are some of the topics we’ll cover in the College Money 101 guide:

• Student loans
• Setting up a budget
• Saving while you’re in college
• Investing
• How to launch a start-up while you’re still in college
• Getting your first apartment
• How to get your first job — and nail the interview
• Negotiating your salary for your first job
• How to ask for a raise — even if it’s your first job out of college
• Understanding your paycheck, 401(k) and other new job money issues
• How to make a big life move after college

We’ll roll out these stories in the next month and then we’ll package them in a neat guide you can read, go back and reference or share it.

And, here’s the cool part: All of these stories are written by interns at NBCUniversal as part of CNBC’s “College Voices” program. College Voices started as a way for students to share stories about what financial and career issues they were facing during college, learn from them and share them with other students, so they could learn from them. So, we’ve asked the students to tackle some big money issues and contact financial advisors and other experts to get tips for how to deal with them. These young journalists are actually living these issues right now, so they’re going to ask the questions they want to know. Then, they’re going to share what they’ve learned with you!

Student loans: Do you know how much you owe?

One of the first big money issues that comes at students fast is student loans.

If, like most students, you don’t have thousands of dollars to pay for your college education, you have to apply for scholarships and take out student loans. There are terms that come with those scholarships and if you miss a deadline, you could be on the hook for that money. The average amount of student loan debt is more than $30,000 and it will take the average borrower about 20 years to pay it back, according to the Education Data Initiative.

You might think of contracts as something older people like your parents get into but if you have scholarships or student loans, you have signed a contract. There are terms and, in the case of student loans, one of those is a requirement at a certain date to pay them back. (Assuming student loans will be forgiven is NOT a viable plan.) You’ve got to know how much you owe, when you need to pay it back and HOW you will pay it back. You have to be making enough money to pay your rent and bills AND your student loans.

Mikaela Cohen, a graduate student at the University of Georgia, tackled the student loan story and said she learned a lot along the way.

“Before writing this article, I knew that the student loan debt crisis in the United States was crippling, but I didn’t realize just how bad it has gotten throughout the last 10 years. It was shocking to learn that the country’s total student loan debt has increased by more than 80% in the last decade,” Cohen said. 

It is a crushing amount of debt to have to carry as you start out your adult life, which — as you’ll learn from Josh Meyers, a junior at Syracuse University who wrote about getting your first apartment — is crazy expensive in and of itself.

Cohen said if she had one piece of advice to pass on to other students after working on this story, it would be this: “Only take out the exact amount that you need to pay for tuition, fees and major living expenses in college like rent. I regret taking out more student loans than I needed during my time in undergrad. I used some of student loans to pay for personal trips and eating out when I shouldn’t have.”

Setting up a budget

One of the most important things students need to do right away is create a budget.

“Setting up a budget early on is important, because just like exercising and eating right, we need to train ourselves to save — really know how to handle our personal finances — so we can pick ourselves up when something goes wrong,” Sun said. “That emergency savings mindset.”

Darreonna Davis, a third-year journalism student at Howard University, said she had always aspired to set up a budget but didn’t really know where to start. She was assigned the story on how to establish a budget and said she now feels like she has a plan. 

“After going on this journey of interviewing both experts and my peers about budgeting, I see it as more of a possibility than just an aspiration,” Davis said. “I have an actual savings goal — to save up enough to afford an apartment in my desired living area post-grad — and I’ve decided to use the 50-30-20 rule.”

The 50-30-20 rule is an approach to budgeting where 50% of your income goes to needs (like rent and food), 30% to wants (like going out to dinner, shopping or going to a concert) and 20% to savings. It’s not the only way, of course, but it’s a great place to start because it’s easy to understand. It’s just three numbers!

Davis also learned that there isn’t just one way to budget or keep track of your numbers. You need to find what works for you. Some people like to create spreadsheets. Some prefer to just write it down or type it in a document. Some like to automate things like bill-paying and savings and track it in an app, while others like to do it manually so you are a part of each transaction.

“Writing/typing and taking notes better helps me retain information and ensures I practice it regularly,” Davis said.

Since writing the story, Davis has vowed to set up a budget and check in with herself regularly to make sure she’s on track.

Getting your first apartment

Graduation is a huge milestone in your life and cause for celebration. Woo hoo! You did it. You got that degree. The world is your oyster! You’ve got plans and dreams.

No doubt your plans and dreams are AMAZING. But! You need money to do that.

You might want to move to a big city like New York. But the question is: Can you afford it?

When you move into your first apartment, you will probably be asked to pay first and last month’s rent as well as a security deposit. You’re going to need to crunch your numbers to figure out how much you make and realistically how much apartment you can afford — what neighborhood, if you need roommates, etc. And, if you are moving to a new — and expensive — city like New York, you really need to do your homework to know exactly how much that is going to cost and if/how you can afford it.

Do you know how much the average rent in New York is right now? $3,630 if you want to live right in Manhattan or $2,850 if you live in the outer borough of Brooklyn, according to a recent report from real estate appraiser Miller Samuel. Of course, there is definitely a way to be able to afford moving to New York, but assuming it will all work out is not the way. Those are definitely some big numbers!

Meyers, who wrote the story in this guide about how to get your first apartment, said it’s important to recognize that some cities are more expensive than others.

“I had a pretty good idea of how expensive NYC was when I moved in. But I was still surprised by how expensive everything was compared to when I lived in Syracuse,” Meyers said. “I buy the same number of groceries in NYC as I did in Syracuse but pay over double the price here just because it’s a bigger city. That was definitely a big adjustment for me.”

Josh’s best advice for college grads getting their first apartment is 1) Know your budget and make sure you have enough money left after you pay your bills for food, activities and your social life and 2) Network as much as possible!

“You’d be surprised how many people are in the same situation you are,” Meyers said. “Reach out to people who have already lived in the city you are moving to and ask where the best place to live would be under your budget.”

Your first job — and your 401(k)

Getting your first job is crazy exciting. You tell everyone you know, they congratulate you and you know that your success train has officially left the station! But, during your orientation, in addition to explaining to you where the cafeteria and bathrooms are, you will also have a million real-life money issues coming at you fast, like choosing a health-care plan, signing up for the company’s 401(k) program, and deciding how much you want to invest and what funds you want to invest it in. So, even if you’re not a finance bro, you’re going to need to know something about investing. And, of course, if you are freelancing or don’t have health care or a 401(k) from your employer, you’re going to need to get that on your own.

When your first paycheck arrives, you’ll find a lot more money than you expected is taken out for taxes. Hopefully it’s still enough to pay the rent and all your bills because you already signed a lease for an apartment, right?

Oh, and now that you are no longer a dependent, you are — woo hoo! — independent, you will also need to start filing your taxes.

It’s a lot, I know. But you’ve got this!

Whether you’re graduating in the class of 2022, still in school or know a college student, please read along with us as we roll out the College Money 101 guide.

And don’t worry if you’re not “good with money.”

“Most of us aren’t born ‘good with money,’ but if you take some time to learn — small steps — it will change your life,” Sun said. “You need to embrace learning about how to better yourself financially. When you have this knowledge, share it with your family, friends, and everyone you care about, because friends don’t let friends struggle financially.”

“College Money 101” is a guide written by college students to help the class of 2022 learn about big money issues they will face in life — from student loans to budgeting and getting their first apartment — and make smart money decisions. And, even if you’re still in school, you can start using this guide right now so you are financially savvy when you graduate and start your adult life on a great financial track. The guide is edited by Cindy Perman.

First up:
Here’s what you need to know about your student loans — before it’s too late

SIGN UP: Money 101 is an eight-week learning course to financial freedom, delivered weekly to your inbox. For the Spanish version Dinero 101, click here.

CHECK OUT: Calculate how much you need to save each paycheck to reach your money goals with Acorns+CNBC

Disclosure: NBCUniversal and Comcast Ventures are investors in Acorns.

Jacho, a junior at Monmouth University in West Long Branch, New Jersey, has roughly $60,000 of debt with several years of school ahead of her.

As a first-generation college student, she has two more years to complete her degree and plans to spend three more years in veterinary school, which can potentially push her student loan debt over $100,000.

“When I was in high school, I actually didn’t quite know a lot about student loans, and I didn’t really know much about financial aid,” Jacho said.

Jacho is not alone in how much student loan debt she’s accumulated.

By the end of 2021, the Federal Reserve reported the total amount of student loan debt in the U.S. reached nearly $1.75 trillion, which has grown more than 80% in the last decade.

It will also take the average borrower 20 years to pay back their student loans, according to the Education Data Initiative. The study shows graduates in 2022 are projected to take 10 years to pay back roughly $45,000 of debt if they make monthly payments of $345.

But the cautionary tale is the more you owe, the longer it will take to pay off.

As national student loan debt skyrockets, here are tips from experts on everything you should know about your student loans before and after you take on debt.

Know what you are getting into

Before you sign up for student loans, know the terms of your loans, know the exact amount you’re taking out, know your deadlines and exhaust every possible scholarship or financial aid option before you take out student loans.

Jacho did exhaust scholarship opportunities, which amounted to $5,000 her first year in school, but it wasn’t enough to offset the continued costs of higher education.

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While you’re still in high school, the first stop in your scholarship hunt should be your guidance counselor’s office. Counselors have access to scholarships specific to students in their schools.

Your next stop for scholarships, and before and after you’re in college, are online scholarship websites such as Fastweb, Going Merry and Cappex. You can find an array of scholarships based on factors like your achievements in high school and your diverse background.

Many students like Jacho go into college with some scholarships, but don’t know how to handle student loans when the scholarships run out.

To find out how student loans work and how much you should take out, the U.S. Department of Education offers online resources through the Federal Student Aid office. Debt.org and American Education Services are also online resources to help manage debt.

Also, make sure to meet deadlines for scholarship applications and student loan acceptance, whether it is through your university or through an outside program. Missing a deadline could mean the difference in paying thousands of dollars. And, if you can’t pay that money, it could wind up in your account being put on hold and you won’t be able to resume attending classes until it’s paid off.

Nele Langhof, a first-generation immigrant and first-generation college student from Germany, said when she was applying to colleges, the entire education system and loan system was completely different, so she and her parents were lost on how much it cost to go to college.

“By the time, I was actually in [college] and my loans started coming in, I think that we were all surprised at the number associated with those,” said Langhof, who is now a proposal coordinator at the Better Communities Collaborative in Athens, Georgia.

Langhof also had scholarships in college, but it still left her roughly $45,000 in debt.

“My biggest advice for college students is to hustle and grind as much as you can before you enter the real world and pay as much you can on your student loans before you graduate,” Langhof said.

Know the rules and numbers

As with most things, once you take out student loans, there’s no going back.

The best place to start is familiarizing yourself with the rules of your specific student loans, said Carolyn McClanahan, founder of Life Planning Partners in Jacksonville, Florida.

“Now that you have school loans and you’ve got to deal with them, it’s important to understand what types of loans you have,” McClanahan said. “There are federal loans and then there’s private loans, which are very different.”

If you take out federal loans through your university or college, make sure to be familiar with the loan provider and access their website to track how much you owe while you’re in school — same for your private loans.

With your federal loans, McClanahan said familiarize yourself with the types of loans you have which can include direct subsidized loans, direct unsubsidized loans, parent PLUS loans and graduate PLUS loans.

Subsidized loans are for undergraduate students only and are based on financial need, according to the Federal Student Aid office. They are beneficial to the borrowers because the federal government pays the interest for you while you’re in school at least part time and for the first six months after you graduate.

Unsubsidized loans are for undergraduate and graduate students, and they are not based on any financial need, according to FSA. But the borrower is responsible for paying back interest on the loans.

McClanahan said you should stick with your federal loans as much as possible before taking out private loans.

“With federal loans, you can get some loan relief to do alternative payment plans,” McClanahan said. “Like the extended payments, income contingent repayment, or the ‘pays as you earn’ plan, these are all programs that people can look up on how to pay that federal loan.”

With private student loans, you don’t get the same deals as federal loans, McClanahan said. Private loans are commonly offered outside of universities, through banks and credit unions.

Winnie Sun, managing partner at Sun Group Wealth Partners in Irvine, California, said borrowers should also pay close attention to interest rates because it is going to dramatically add cost to your student loans over time.

Before the federal pause on student loan interest and repayment, interest rates on federal loans ranged from 3.73% to 6.28%, according to FSA.

Sun said borrowers should know the exact interest rates on each of their loans before and after taking out loans.

“The thing you want to do is understand the rules of each of your loans, and then you start off trying to pay off the highest interest rate loans first, which tend to be the private loans,” McClanahan said.

Sun said borrowers should also be aware of how much their total debt is and what their average payments will be.

“Most people have more than one loan, and I recommend creating a really simple spreadsheet,” Sun said. “Do it on Google Sheets or Excel, and just write down what the loan is, what the amount is and the interest rate that you currently owe on that loan.”

Mistakes to avoid

Sun said the biggest mistake to avoid is not making your minimum monthly payment.

“At least pay the minimum amount each month, and make that your goal,” Sun said. “If you can, maybe do some gig work or do a little freelancing, whatever you need to do, temporarily, to try and pay extra payments, but you have to make your minimum payment.”

Sun recommends working your minimum monthly payment into your budget, as you would with your car payment or electricity bill. While the moratorium is still in place until May 1, Sun said borrowers should still plan for their student loan payments to be incorporated in their monthly budgets soon — do not assume that it will be extended or that student loan forgiveness will happen.

If you don’t make the minimum payment, it can affect your credit score and your ability to buy a house or car, and it could potentially prevent employment opportunities if an employer runs a credit check on your background.

Sun said it is a mistake to let your monthly payment go unpaid, without reaching out for help and talking to people about it.

“Communication is key. Reach out to your loan servicers and let them know this issue. You’re not going to be the only one,” Sun said. “Have these conversations early and don’t wait until the last minute to see if you can find help on this.”

Although Langhof didn’t miss a monthly payment, her student loans still prevented her from co-signing for a home with her partner because her student loan debt was a liability.

“If you have outstanding debt that you’re not paying, you’re a liability for car payments, for insurance and for housing. Don’t put yourself in that position,” Langhof said. “Don’t put yourself behind if you can pay the minimum, that’s why it’s called a minimum.”

Think big picture

While you’re in college, it is hard to think past this week’s exam or the essay that’s due tonight that you haven’t started on yet, but the choices you make while you’re in school have long-term ramifications.

“One big mistake a lot of students make when they’re starting out in college is they don’t really think about the cost versus how much money they’re going to make with the degree they have,” McClanahan said.

For students entering college, they should research how much a starting salary is in the field of their desired degree and try to only take out loans that equal that starting salary.

“It’s really important for people, as they’re in college, to make sure that they know what kind of jobs they’re going to have available when they get out of college,” McClanahan added. “So they don’t overborrow for a degree that doesn’t pay enough to get the money back.”

Some college students get into student debt without realizing how it will affect their future life plans. Like Langhof, it affected her ability to buy a house, but it could also push back other major life events like getting married or even starting a family.

Eighty-one percent of adults with student loans say they have delayed major life events because of their debt, according to CNBC and Acorn’s recently released Invest in You Student Loan Survey conducted by Momentive. The online poll was conducted Jan. 10-13 among a national sample of 5,162 adults.

Student loan debt can be even more crippling for women and people of color. According to the CNBC and Acorn survey, women are more likely than men to have student loan debt, and the survey found Black women and Hispanic women have the highest amounts of student loan debt.

The survey found 11% of white men, 17% of white women, 15% of Black men, 31% of Black women, 10% of Hispanic men and 19% of Hispanic women have student debt.

Loan forgiveness could be life-changing

As federal student loan forgiveness remains up in the air and the moratorium on repayment is set to end May 1, many borrowers are left hoping for the best but preparing for the worst.

Some students have even taken a laissez-faire attitude on student loan debt. As a 24-year-old graduate student who finished an undergraduate degree in 2020, a lot of my peers are recent graduates who haven’t made a single student loan payment due to extensions caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.

One friend has said to me that they don’t have any plans at all on repaying their student loans, and they said they “just can’t think that far ahead” because they have too many other bills to pay.

It can be a contentious debate on the economic effects that student loan forgiveness could have on the U.S. economy, but the varying proposed amounts in forgiveness — $10,000, $50,000 or more — could all mean tremendous relief for borrowers.

If the federal government does forgive any amount of debt, it could be life-changing for borrowers from lower socioeconomic backgrounds, like Jacho, who is a first-generation, Latina student, a demographic most adversely affected by student loan debt.

“All I know is I would be crying in tears knowing that all my debt is paid,” Jacho said. “I’ll be able to sleep better at night if I didn’t have so much debt that I have to pay.”

Student loan forgiveness could also have a tremendous effect on borrowers’ mental health. More than 60% of borrowers say student loan debt has negatively affected their mental health, according to the CNBC and Acorns survey.

“If all of my debt was paid off, I’d basically be okay with my career and move forward with life,” said Jacho.

“I hope there is loan forgiveness, but I think that it’s going to take a while to sort out,” Sun said. “Anything pertaining to the government usually takes a little bit longer. Although, we’ve seen promise with the current administration actually doing it.”

Checklist

Here’s a checklist to help you be smart about the loans you take out, keep track of them and pay them back as quickly as possible:

1. In high school, apply for scholarships and learn about student loan types.
2. Research how much a starting salary could be for the degree you want to earn.
3. In college, contact your school about deadlines for accepting or denying different student loans available to you.
4. Only take out the student loans you absolutely need.
5. Find out interest rates on your student loans and keep track of your total debt on a spreadsheet.
6. Pay back student loans while you’re still in school as much as you can.
7. After you graduate, incorporate your minimum monthly payment in your monthly budget.
8. Pay more toward your loans as frequently as you can.
9. Ask for help if you need it — contact your student loan provider.
10. Research relief programs and alternative repayment options based on your financial situation.

“College Money 101” is a guide written by college students to help the class of 2022 learn about big money issues they will face in life — from student loans to budgeting and getting their first apartment — and make smart money decisions. And, even if you’re still in school, you can start using this guide right now so you are financially savvy when you graduate and start your adult life on a great financial track. Mikaela Cohen is a graduate student at the University of Georgia pursuing a master’s degree in journalism. She is currently an editorial intern for CNBC Make It. The guide is edited by Cindy Perman.

SIGN UP: Money 101 is an eight-week learning course to financial freedom, delivered weekly to your inbox. For the Spanish version Dinero 101, click here.

CHECK OUT: Calculate how much you need to save each paycheck to reach your money goals with Acorns+CNBC

Disclosure: NBCUniversal and Comcast Ventures are investors in Acorns.

The IRS has already issued more than 45 million refunds this year, at an average $3,352 each.

That’s over $500 more than last year, when the average refund was just over $2,800.

For most Americans, a lump-sum payment of this size is rare and fewer people want to squander it.

Now, nearly half — or 46% — of tax filers plan to save their refunds, according to a LendingTree survey, up from 41% last year and 40% in 2020.

“The tax refund is often the biggest windfall households receive all year,” said Greg McBride, chief financial analyst at Bankrate.com.

In order to make the most of that money, experts recommend focusing on the long-term, particularly if you’ve been been hit hard by the pandemic.

Here are three ways to invest your tax refund in your future:

1. Build up your emergency savings

More than one-third, or 34%, of households have less in emergency savings now than they did before the pandemic, according to Bankrate.com.

“Households that have experienced income disruption during the pandemic are very likely to need to rebuild their emergency savings,” McBride said.

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Most financial experts recommend stashing away at least a six-month cushion — or more if you are the sole breadwinner in your family or in business for yourself.

Direct depositing that tax refund into an emergency savings account is a great way to take a significant step forward financially and give yourself a much-needed cushion for whatever lies ahead, McBride said.

2. ‘Turbocharge’ your retirement

If you’ve established a solid emergency fund, then consider your retirement savings, advised Rita Assaf, vice president of retirement leadership at Fidelity Investments.

“This is a great way to turbocharge your savings,” she said.

Assaf recommends contributing at least enough to your workplace retirement account to take full advantage of the employer match or, if possible, the maximum amount workers under 50 can put in, which is now $20,500 in 2022.

if you can afford even more, Assaf recommends contributing to both a 401(k) and an individual retirement account. You can set up direct deposit into either a traditional IRA or Roth IRA account and contribute up to $6,000 in total. (Generally, traditional IRAs are most effective if you expect to be in a lower tax bracket when you retire, while Roth IRAs are best for those in a lower tax bracket today.)

Another option is to purchase federal I bonds, which are inflation-protected and nearly risk-free assets, paying a 7.12% annual rate through April. As the cost of living spikes, this will work well as a hedge against inflation for long-term savers — the downside is that you can’t redeem I bonds for one year, and you’ll pay the last three months of interest if cashed in before five years.

3. Plan for your children’s future

“If your family is financially able to do so, leveraging a tax refund to jumpstart education or disability savings is a great opportunity to support long-term goals,” said Mary Morris, CEO of Virginia529 and ABLEnow.

Many 529 college savings plans offer tax benefits that are better than using a simple savings account.

Not only can you get a tax deduction or credit for contributions (currently 34 states and the District of Columbia offer a direct state tax deduction for your contributions), earnings grow on a tax-advantaged basis and, when you withdraw the money, it is tax-free if the funds are used for qualified education expenses such as tuition, fees, books, and room and board.

Generally, you will need to have opened an account first but with many plans you start with as little as $10, Morris said. That “money can grow free from federal taxes, and an upfront lump-sum contribution may benefit from potential market gains,” she added.

Similarly, you can set up to $16,000 aside in an ABLE account, which is another tax-advantaged savings plan, also administered by individual states, for people with disabilities and their families.

The money in ABLE accounts grows and can be withdrawn tax-free and the funds can be used for a variety of expenses, from housing to long-term health care, all without any limitations on the number of withdrawals.

Using your tax refund to put a few hundred — or thousand — dollars in into one of these accounts could be “a real game changer for families that have not been able to save or plan for the future,” Morris said.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., are among those calling on President Joe Biden to bypass Congress and forgive student debt through executive order.

“You just need the flick of a pen,” Schumer has often been quoted saying on the matter.

Yet there might be another way the White House can cancel student debt without passing legislation, according to a recent analysis by higher-education expert Mark Kantrowitz.

The details are wonky, but basically Kantrowitz argues that federal student loans could be forgiven through regulatory changes established by the executive branch. Specifically, he argues that one popular government program, known as the Income-Contingent Repayment Plan, can be amended to distribute broad cancellation.

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Usually, an ICR Plan erases a borrower’s debt after 25 years of payments, but Kantrowitz says a tweak could shorten that timeline. Borrowers may need to file an application for the relief, but he doubts that would be much of a roadblock “given the strong financial incentive of loan forgiveness.”

In theory, Congress could block the changes put forth by the White House, but Kantrowitz doubts there would be enough support for that.

“They would need two-thirds of the House and two-thirds of the Senate to challenge it, which is extremely unlikely to happen,” he said. On the other hand, Kantrowitz suspects loan forgiveness through executive order would probably face legal challenges.

If the regulations by the Biden administration, which would be issued by the U.S. Department of Education, were published by Nov. 1, they could go into effect as soon July 2023, and maybe even earlier.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment on whether it had seen Kantrowitz’s analysis.

Advocates, lawyers and Democrats have been looking for ways for the president to forgive student debt on his own. Most experts agree legislation in Congress is unlikely to pass given the unpopularity of loan cancellation among Republicans.

During the 2020 Democratic presidential primary, Warren vowed to forgive student loans in the first days of her administration. She included in her announcement an analysis written by three legal experts, based at the Project on Predatory Student Lending at Harvard Law School, who described such a move as “lawful and permissible.”

Luke Herrine, Ph.D. in Law candidate at Yale Law School, first made the argument in 2017 that the Education Department could cancel student debt.

“Basically it’s like the power that a prosecutor has to determine whether to bring charges against somebody,” Herrine said. “The prosecutor might think that a person has committed a crime but decide not to bring a case against them for whatever reason.” Similarly, the government could decide not to enforce people’s debt obligations.

A recent poll found that nearly 66% of likely voters are in support of Biden canceling some or all of student debt. More than 70% of Latino and Black voters are in favor.

Since March 2020, when the coronavirus pandemic first hit the U.S. and crippled the economy, most federal student loan holders have been given the option to not pay their monthly bill. In addition, interest hasn’t been allowed to accrue on their debt.

The reprieve has impacted more than 25 million Americans and has been extended five times throughout the public health crisis. It’s currently slated to end May 2.

However, White House chief of staff Ron Klain said earlier this month that the Biden administration wanted to make its decision around debt cancellation before it turned the payments back on.

“The president is going to look at what we should do on student debt before the pause expires, or he’ll extend the pause,” Klain said on the podcast “Pod Save America.”

Most recently, the Education Department ordered the companies that service federal student loans to hold off on sending borrowers notices about their payments restarting.

The U.S. Department of Education announced on Wednesday that it would take steps to hold the owners of certain private colleges that closed or defrauded students accountable for taxpayer losses.

Companies that own these schools could be on the hook for liabilities including government costs for closed school discharges and borrower defense to repayment claims, under which former students get their federal loans canceled because of problems with their education.

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“If a company owns, controls or profits from a college, it should also be on the hook if the institution fails students,” said Under Secretary of Education James Kvaal, in a statement.

“Today’s steps will ensure taxpayers aren’t held liable for colleges that fail their students or close their doors, especially without the opportunity for students to finish their courses of study,” Kvaal added.

Under the policy, organizations or entities could be responsible for financial losses if they have at least a 50% interest in a nonpublic college.

Since President Joe Biden took office, the Education Department has approved more than $17 billion in targeted loan debt forgiveness for more than 700,000 borrowers who attended problematic colleges.

At the same time, colleges have promised to support Russian students on their campuses, opposing calls from a few in Congress to remove them from the country as a sanction against their homeland.

The moves are mostly symbolic — U.S. colleges have little power to sway Russia or squeeze its finances, and academic exchange between the nations has always been meager. But the suggestion that some or all Russian students should forfeit the opportunity to study here has drawn new attention to the role of universities in global disputes.

Last academic year, U.S. colleges hosted nearly 5,000 students from Russia, less than 1% of all international students. Advocates for international education say losing those students would forgo a chance to expose them to western ideals, and they say Russians who choose to study in America are already more likely to want change back home.

“Leaders need to make a distinction between Putin and Russian people who want a better life,” said Jill Welch, a senior adviser for the Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, a coalition of university presidents. “Sending anyone back wouldn’t shorten any war by a day.”

Many universities have called for compassion for students from Russia who, like those from Ukraine, may fear for the safety of family members or face sudden financial difficulty.

In a message to students, Columbia University’s president said students from both countries face a “bewildering and uncertain road ahead.”

At the University of Washington, President Ana Mari Cauce said the campus stands with Ukraine but “must also take care to not let the actions of Russia’s authoritarian government affect our treatment of Russian students, scholars and community members who have no role in its policies.”

Some in Congress have pushed for visa restrictions against Russian students. Speaking on CNN last month, Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., said the U.S. should consider “kicking every Russian student out of the United States” as a way to stir backlash against Vladimir Putin in Russia.

The idea has gained little support in Washington, but the White House later suggested that its separate sanctions against Russian oligarchs are partly intended to block access to U.S. universities.

“What we’re talking about here is seizing their assets, seizing their yachts, and making it harder for them to send their children to colleges and universities in the West,” press secretary Jen Psaki said last week while discussing the sanctions.

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College leaders aren’t fighting the idea that oligarchs and their children should lose access to American education. But wider action against Russian students would carry echoes of America’s discrimination toward Japanese and German immigrants during World War II, advocates say.

“In our country, we do not punish children for the crimes of their parents,” said Barbara Snyder, president of the Association of American Universities and a former president of Case Western Reserve University. “You have to think carefully about the consequences of targeting people because of their country of origin.”

For many colleges, the first priority has been to remove American students studying in Russia or Ukraine, although few are believed to have been there. A total of 1,400 Americans studied in those nations in 2018, and overall study abroad figures have plummeted during the pandemic.

Middlebury College in Vermont suspended a study abroad program in Russia at the end of February citing safety concerns, urging the 12 students to return home. Among them was Zavier Ridgley, who was studying in Moscow when he was told to book a flight home quickly.

The 22-year-old said he respects the decision but was disappointed. A senior at Tulane University, he had been trying to get into the Middlebury program since 2019, but it had been delayed by the pandemic.

“The month I’ve been here has been nothing short of the opportunity of a lifetime, and to have it cut so short so abruptly really is terribly sad,” said Ridgley, who has since returned home.

Other schools have joined in barring student travel to Russia, and some including Dartmouth College have canceled upcoming study abroad programs. A growing number are also severing financial and academic ties as a rebuke of Putin, but the U.S. response has been more scattered compared with Europe, where nations including Germany, the Netherlands and Denmark have ordered colleges to freeze academic exchange with Russia.

Soon after the invasion began, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology said it was ending its partnership with the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology, a research university it helped found near Moscow in 2011. MIT officials called it a rejection of “the unacceptable military actions against Ukraine.”

After Colorado Gov. Jared Polis urged universities to cut investments with Russia last week, the University of Colorado said it was divesting all holdings in the country, including $3.5 million in mutual funds.

Several other states have also told colleges to pull investments, including Virginia, Ohio and Arizona.

Presidents of Arizona’s public universities notified the state Monday that they were ending financial and academic ties with Russia in response to an order from the state’s board of regents. Arizona State University announced it will part with a corporate training center in Moscow affiliated with its business school.

Other colleges are reviewing contracts or financial donations from Russian sources, but some had no plans to return the money or end deals.

Stanford University received $1.6 million through a contract with an undisclosed Russian source in December 2020, according to U.S. Education Department records. A university spokesperson said it’s an agreement for online business courses and that Stanford is in “full compliance” with U.S. sanctions.

Last year, Rutgers University reported a new contract with Russia. The school said it’s a deal with the Russian State University for the Humanities in Moscow for research and information exchange through November 2023. Officials said the agreement is currently inactive.

Click here for complete coverage of the crisis in Ukraine.

AP reporter Lisa Rathke contributed to this report from Marshfield, Vermont.

Recent news the White House is considering extending the payment pause for student loan borrowers once more came as a bit of a surprise to some.

The Biden administration has been insisting that the bills will resume in May, pointing out that the economy is riding a historic recovery.

However, restarting payments for the tens of millions of Americans with student loans after more than two years of being paused will be logistically, and politically, complicated, experts say. As a result, borrowers may not have to worry about the payments for many more months.

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Here are some reasons another extension could be coming.

1. Biden is still weighing student loan forgiveness

White House chief of staff Ron Klain said earlier this month the Biden administration wanted to make its decision on debt cancellation before it turned the payments back on.

“The president is going to look at what we should do on student debt before the pause expires, or he’ll extend the pause,” Klain said on the podcast “Pod Save America.”

The administration may push back the payments because it isn’t ready to announce its plan on forgiveness.

On the campaign trail, President Joe Biden promised to quickly cancel $10,000 per borrower, but he’s increasingly under pressure from some Democrats and advocates to wipe out more.  Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., are pushing him to cancel up to $50,000 for all.

Resuming the bills and then later reducing or erasing people’s loan balances may lead to confusion, said higher education expert Mark Kantrowitz.

“Ideally, if the federal government were to forgive some student loans, they’d want to do so before the payment pause and interest waiver expires,” he said.

But, more than that, Kantrowitz said, “the reasons for a further extension are driven by politics, not policy.”

He went on, “Restarting repayment without forgiving student loans will provide progressives with another opportunity to criticize the Biden administration.”

2. The midterms are looming

To that point, some Democrats and advocates have said resuming student loan payments before the midterm elections in November could hurt Democrats on the ballots.

“Restarting student loan payments just before a midterm election is politically idiotic,” said Luke Herrine, former legal director of the advocacy group the Debt Collective, a national union of debtors.

The Government Accountability Office found that as many as half of people with federal student debt may be at increased risk of delinquency when payments turn back on, which the Biden administration likely doesn’t want to see headlines about as Election Day approaches.

A recent poll found that nearly two-thirds of likely voters are in support of Biden canceling some or all of student debt, with more than 70% of Latino and Black voters in favor.

3. Multiple loan servicers are changing

Three companies that serviced federal student loans — Navient, the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency (also known as FedLoan) and Granite State — all recently announced that they’d be ending their relationship with the government.

As a result, around 16 million borrowers will have their accounts transferred to a different company.

These transitions are still underway and extending the pause may give the government and servicers more time to get ready for the resumption of payments.

“Changing a borrower’s loan servicer and restarting repayment at about the same time may contribute to borrower confusion,” Kantrowitz said.

Correction: Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., are pushing President Biden to cancel up to $50,000 for all. An earlier version misstated the figure.

If you’re eager to jump-start an education fund, you may consider a larger, upfront contribution to a 529 college savings plan.

While the average account balance was $30,287 in 2021, according to the College Savings Plans Network, depositing and investing sooner may pay off, experts say.

“The earlier you get money into a college plan, the more it will grow,” said certified financial planner Mari Adam, senior wealth advisor at Mercer Advisors in Boca Raton, Florida.

A 529 plan allows you to grow money tax-free for qualified education expenses, such as college, vocational school or up to $10,000 of K-12 tuition per year. 

While there’s no federal tax deduction for contributions, you may qualify for a write-off at the state level, depending on where you live, Adam said.

Plan contribution limits vary by state, ranging from $235,000 to $550,000, according to Saving for College.

Front-loading contributions may also avoid missing future deposits since only 37% of 529 plans currently receive automated savings.

“The best time to invest is when you have the money available,” said John Loyd, a CFP and owner at The Wealth Planner in Fort Worth, Texas, pointing to upward stock market trends over time.

Of course, there’s a risk of overfunding a plan if the beneficiary doesn’t need funds for education. You’ll owe income taxes and a 10% penalty on earnings for nonqualified withdrawals. However, there may be other options for the money.

“These plans have tremendous portability,” said Philip Herzberg, a CFP and lead financial advisor at Team Hewins in Miami, explaining you can change the beneficiary to another family member or even a future child after they are born.

Super funding 529 plans

Another technique, super funding a 529 plan, may appeal to wealthy families trying to reduce future estate taxes through gifting.

You can give away $16,000 per gift in 2022 without owing federal gift tax. And many won’t owe levies for larger amounts, either.

“Most people don’t have any kind of gift tax issues,” Loyd said.

That’s because the federal estate and gift tax lifetime exemption is currently $12.06 million per person in 2022. But it reverts to $5 million adjusted for inflation in 2026 when part of former President Donald Trump’s signature tax law sunsets. 

If you expect your estate to be larger than either of those amounts when you die, you may avoid gift tax by “super funding” a 529 plan with five years of contributions at once, removing that money from your estate.

For example, if you’re single with an estate over the lifetime exemption, you may contribute $16,000 times five years or $80,000 in 2022 without paying gift tax (or $160,000 if your spouse agrees to “split” gifts.)

“This is really a fabulous opportunity to get money into college plans,” Adam said.

And recent stock market volatility may present opportunities, Herzberg explained. “You want to take advantage of those depressed prices with a lump sum investment.”

However, borrowers might not be ready to restart payments and could therefore fall behind on their loans, according to a recent blog post from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.

“Serious delinquency rates for student debt could snap back from historic lows to their previous highs in which 10% or more of the debt was past due,” wrote Lowell Ricketts, a data scientist for the Institute for Economic Equity at the bank and author of the blog post.

Resuming payments will affect many borrowers differently and place the most pressure on those with the heaviest burdens — often low-income workers and people of color, the blog post said.

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Among the class of 2016, the average student loan balance was $42,746 one year following graduation for Black students compared with $34,622 for white students, according to data from the National Center for Economic Statistics,” Ricketts wrote. “Therefore, the resumption of student loan repayments will raise the burden on Black students’ budgets more so than whites.”

Other student loan experts are worried that restarting payments could push up delinquencies as people have grown out of the habit of paying their loans and are now dealing with higher inflation that’s squeezing budgets.

“I think we’re going to have even higher delinquency and default rates than we did pre-pandemic,” said Betsy Mayotte, president of The Institute of Student Loan Advisors, a nonprofit.

What borrowers can do now

To be sure, the current pause on federal student loan payments and interest may not end in May. White House chief of staff Ron Klain said in a recent interview that the Biden administration is looking at the current situation with student loan debt and considering further extending the pause.

Still, borrowers should prepare for payments to restart sooner rather than later and use that time to rework their budgets and get in touch with their lenders. Here are four things all borrowers should do now, according to Mayotte.

1. Make sure you know your loan servicer: A few major loan servicers have decided not to renew their contracts with the federal government, so some borrowers could have a different servicer than they did pre-pandemic, said Mayotte. If you’re not sure this applies to you, the easiest way to check is to log into your account at Studentaid.gov. This will tell you who is servicing your federal student loans.
   
2. Open mail from your servicer and check your email: Many servicers have been sending reminder messages about payments resuming, which could be emails or letters, said Mayotte.
   
   Borrowers should make sure they open all communications to ensure they don’t miss important information about payment deadlines or what they need to do if they want to switch payment plans, for example.
   
3. Check what your payment is going to be: Closer to payments coming due, borrowers should make sure they know how much they need to pay to their loans each month, said Mayotte. And they need to make sure that payment fits their budget, as personal financial circumstances may have drastically changed since the start of the pandemic
   
   For some, they may be able to pay more now than they were previously, which is a great way to ensure you’ll pay the least amount of money to your loans over time, said Mayotte. There’s never a penalty for paying more than you’re expected to monthly, she said.
   
4. Adjust accordingly: On the flip side, some people may not be able to afford the same payments as before the pandemic. If so, borrowers should first see what their payment would be on an income-driven repayment plan. For many, it will lower their monthly amount owed and, in some cases, could even be zero. That’s usually a better option than deferring loans, putting them in forbearance or simply not paying, which will make you delinquent, said Mayotte.
   
   If you do need to switch plans, you should send in the paperwork as soon as possible, said Mayotte. There are some 45 million student loan borrowers who will be entering repayment at the same time, which could overwhelm for the system.
   
   “I’m expecting longer call wait times or a longer period of time for paperwork,” she said.

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President Joe Biden made no mention of student loan forgiveness at his State of the Union address on Tuesday. Yet a spokesperson for the administration says cancellation remains on the table.

White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain said a decision on whether to forgive student debt through executive action will be made before the payments resume. The bills, which have been on pause since March 2020, are currently scheduled to start back up again in May.

“The president is going to look at what we should do on student debt before the pause expires, or he’ll extend the pause,” Klain said on the podcast “Pod Save America,” which was posted Thursday night.

The payment pause has already been extended five times throughout the pandemic.

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Some Democrats, advocates and borrowers have been frustrated that Biden has made little to no mention of loan cancellation since he’s been in office. On the campaign trail, he promised to quickly cancel $10,000 per borrower.

In addition to skipping the topic in his speech to the nation this week, he also didn’t answer a reporter’s question if he planned to still cancel the debt at a recent news conference.

The White House has maintained that the president is still considering cancellation.

Critics of a student debt jubilee say that it would be unfair to those who didn’t borrow for their education or who’ve paid off their loans and that it wouldn’t significantly stimulate the economy because college graduates tend to be higher earners more likely to redirect their monthly bill to savings than additional spending.

Yet progressives and advocates say the student debt crisis has caused the most pain for women, people of color and those who didn’t come from wealthy families who could foot the rising costs of a college education.

And they warn that inaction will hurt Democrats in the November midterms.

“A lack of movement on student debt cancellation will result in the Democratic party’s base — young people, Black voters — staying at home,” said Thomas Gokey, co-founder of the Debt Collective, a national union of debtors.

A recent poll found that nearly two-thirds of likely voters are in support of Biden canceling some or all of student debt, with more than 70% of Latino and Black voters in favor.

Gokey said it was clear advocates were having an impact on the White House’s deliberations.

“A few months ago they were adamant they had extended the payment pause for the last time,” Gokey said.

Yet he hopes that the administration doesn’t forgive $10,000 only to “sweeten restarting payments.” He and others are advocating for cancelling all of student debt.

“Cancelling $10,000 is the same thing as cancelling nothing for the vast majority of people,” he said. “We need to get everyone to zero.”

If picking a college comes down to the financial bottom line, then an in-state public school is often the best deal.

“In-state tuition is half to two-thirds lower than out-of-state,” said Mark Kantrowitz, author of “How to Appeal for More College Financial Aid.”

Since the start of the pandemic, students and their families are increasingly wary of the cost of a degree and hefty student loan debt that often goes along with it. That makes public college look even more attractive.

Tuition and fees plus room and board for in-state students at four-year public colleges averaged $27,330 in the 2021-22 school year; for out-of-state students, it was $44,150, according to the College Board. In comparison, students at four-year private college pay $55,800, on average, although when factoring in other expenses, the total tab can be more than $70,000 a year.

At the State University of New York, for example, in-state students pay just $7,000 for tuition, or roughly $23,350 a year including room and board and other fees.

“This is not the same as $75,000,” said Nancy Zimpher, a senior fellow at the National Association of System Heads and the former chancellor of the State University of New York. “Our costs are high, not exorbitant.”

New York’s Excelsior Scholarship also covers four years of tuition for families that meet certain income thresholds. “When you talk about the cost of college and lump everything in there, it’s not a level playing field,” Zimpher said.

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However, moving in order to establish residency for in-state tuition is a particularly high bar.

“The reason why states subsidize college tuition is because state residents pay taxes,” Kantrowitz said. “You don’t want someone to move to the state for lower-cost tuition and then leave.”

Although each state has different requirements for determining whether a student can qualify to pay the reduced rate for residents, in most cases families must have a permanent home and have lived and worked there for at least a year.

You may also need to have a local driver’s license, filed tax returns and be registered to vote in the state.

Independent students must further prove that they do not receive financial support from their parents or guardians and have lived and worked in that state on their own for at least a year before enrolling in college.  

“The standard of evidence that most of the schools use is clear and convincing,” Kantrowitz said. “They want to see a lot of evidence that you are a state resident and no evidence to the contrary.”

There is also another way.

The U.S. Department of Education awards about $120 billion every year to help students pay for higher education. And beyond federal aid, students could also be eligible for financial assistance from their state or college.

Yet fewer students are filling out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA, which serves as the gateway to all federal money, including loans, work-study and grants. Most say it’s because they didn’t think they would qualify, studies show. 

In total, the high school Class of 2021 left an estimated $3.75 billion in Pell Grants on the table by not completing the FAFSA, according to a recent report from the National College Attainment Network.  

“Never cross an expensive school off of your list of consideration based on sticker price alone,” said Robert Franek, The Princeton Review’s editor-in-chief. “Many of those schools are giving out substantial scholarships — this is free money.”

At some private colleges, the average scholarship award is just over $50,000, The Princeton Review found, which brings the total out-of-pocket cost down to less than $20,000.

When it comes to offering aid, private schools typically have more money to spend, Franek added.

“The truth is, it could end up being less expensive than public college.”

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In President Joe Biden‘s more than hourlong State of the Union address Tuesday night, he made no mention of federal student loan forgiveness, worrying advocates and borrowers that he’s walking back on one of his key campaign promises.

Biden instead focused on topics such as raising the minimum wage, extending the child tax credit and implementing paid family leave, after the first part of his speech was dedicated to denouncing President Vladimir Putin of Russia for the invasion of Ukraine.

Asked why Biden didn’t mention student loans, the White House said it continues to explore its options for canceling student debt. However, the lack of movement or even mention of loan cancellation is a signal to many that it’s becoming less of a priority for the administration, which says it plans to resume the payments in May after more than two years of pausing them because of the Covid pandemic‘s financial fallout.

At a recent news conference, a reporter asked the president if he still planned on canceling student debt. He didn’t answer.

“On a night when President Biden took time to list his priorities for the coming year, to hear absolutely nothing about student loan debt is so discouraging and sad,” said Scott Heins, a photojournalist in Brooklyn, New York, who still owes around $20,000 after more than a decade of payments.

“[He] boasted about the state of the economy and the jobs created under his watch, but what about the 43 million Americans who are burdened with debt simply because they went to college?” Heins, 33, said.

Even before the pandemic, the country’s outstanding student loan debt balance exceeded $1.7 trillion and posed a larger burden to households than credit card or auto debt. Roughly a quarter of borrowers, or 10 million people, were estimated to be in delinquency or default. A recent report by the Government Accountability Office found that as many as half of people with federal student debt may now be at increased risk of falling behind.

Still, with the midterm elections looming, the president appeared to stay away from more contentious topics during his speech, which may explain the omission of debt cancellation, said higher education expert Mark Kantrowitz. Republicans mostly oppose canceling education debt.

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“It looks like he’s going mostly for issues that have bipartisan support, with a few standard Democratic issues thrown in,” Kantrowitz said.

Critics of a student debt jubilee say that it would be unfair to those who didn’t borrow for their education and who’ve paid off their loans, and that it wouldn’t significantly stimulate the economy because college graduates tend to be higher earners more likely to redirect their monthly bill to savings than additional spending.

Yet progressives and advocates say the student debt crisis has caused the most pain for women, people of color and those who didn’t come from wealthy families who could foot the rising bills of a college education. And they warn that inaction will cost Democrats in November.

“A lack of movement on student debt cancellation will result in the Democratic party’s base — young people, Black voters — staying at home,” said Thomas Gokey, co-founder of the Debt Collective, a national union of debtors.

A recent poll found that nearly two-thirds of likely voters are in support of Biden canceling some or all of student debt, with more than 70% of Latino and Black voters in favor.

The IRS has already issued 22 million refunds, at an average $3,536 each. 

That’s $700 more than last year, when the average refund was just over $2,800.

For most people, a lump-sum payment of this size is rare.

“The tax refund is often the biggest windfall households receive all year,” said Greg McBride, chief financial analyst at Bankrate.com.

In order to make the most of that money, experts recommend focusing on the long-term, particularly if you’ve been been hit hard by the coronavirus crisis.

Here are three ways to invest your tax refund in your future:

1. Build up your emergency savings

More than one-third, or 34%, of households have less emergency savings now than they did before the pandemic, according to Bankrate.com.

“Households that have experienced income disruption during the pandemic are very likely to need to rebuild their emergency savings,” McBride said.

Most financial experts recommend stashing at least a six-month cushion — or more if you are the sole breadwinner in your family or in business for yourself.

Direct depositing that tax refund into an emergency savings account is a great way to take a significant step forward financially and give yourself a much-needed cushion for whatever lies ahead, McBride said.

2. ‘Turbocharge’ your retirement

If you’ve established a solid emergency fund, then consider your retirement savings, advised Rita Assaf, vice president of retirement leadership at Fidelity Investments.

“This is a great way to turbocharge your savings,” she said.

Assaf recommends contributing at least enough to your workplace retirement account to take full advantage of the employer match or, if possible, the maximum amount workers under 50 can put in, which is now $20,500 in 2022.

if you can afford even more, Assaf recommends contributing to both a 401(k) and an IRA. You can set up direct deposit into either a traditional IRA or Roth IRA account and contribute up to $6,000 in total. (Generally, traditional IRAs are most effective if you expect to be in a lower tax bracket when you retire, while Roth IRAs are best for those in a lower tax bracket today.)

3. Plan for your children’s future

“If your family is financially able to do so, leveraging a tax refund to jumpstart education or disability savings is a great opportunity to support long-term goals,” said Mary Morris, CEO of Virginia529 and ABLEnow.

Many 529 college savings plans offer tax benefits that are better than using a simple savings account.

Not only can you get a tax deduction or credit for contributions (currently 34 states and the District of Columbia offer a direct state tax deduction for your contributions), earnings grow on a tax-advantaged basis and, when you withdraw the money, it is tax-free if the funds are used for qualified education expenses such as tuition, fees, books, and room and board.

Generally, you will need to have opened an account first but with many plans you start with as little as $10, Morris said. That “money can grow free from federal taxes, and an upfront lump-sum contribution may benefit from potential market gains,” she added.

Similarly, you can set up to $16,000 aside in an ABLE account, which is another tax-advantaged savings plan, also administered by individual states, for people with disabilities and their families.

The money in ABLE accounts grows and can be withdrawn tax-free and the funds can be used for a variety of expenses, from housing to long-term health care, all without any limitations on the number of withdrawals.

Using your tax refund to put a few hundred — or thousand — dollars in into one of these accounts could be “a real game changer for families that have not been able to save or plan for the future,” Morris said.

It’s been almost two years since most borrowers have had to pay their monthly student loan bill.

And yet, 93% of them are not prepared to resume payments on May 1, according to a survey of more than 23,000 student loan borrowers by the Student Debt Crisis Center and Savi.

“The payment pause has meant everything,” said Allison Newmes, 44. “There are no words.”

Newmes, a mother of three in Youngsville, North Carolina, has a federal loan balance of roughly $46,000 and monthly payments over $600. 

Her husband, Ernest, works as a mechanical engineer but his heart condition left the couple with substantial medical debt, Newmes said. They’ve cashed in their 401(k) retirement accounts to make ends meet and now the couple has no financial safety net.  

“I don’t know how we are going to do it,” she said of the upcoming student loan payments.  

“It’s like we’re falling through the cracks.”

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Once payments restart, the amount due will be largely the same, since interest on most federal student loans was suspended during the government’s payment pause.

However, the cost of living has dramatically changed.

According to the most recent government data, the Consumer Price Index, which measures the costs of consumer goods, is up 7.5% — the fastest annual pace in about four decades.

Even as wages rise, inflation has eroded pay by 1.7% over the past year.

Since her husband is disabled and unable to work, Laura Estrada, 56, now has two jobs to cover their costs.

Estrada and her husband live in Wichita Falls, Texas, where rents are on the rise. The couple has a monthly rent payment of $1,350. “In this area, that’s actually pretty cheap,” she said.

But with a degree in English and Master’s in criminal justice, she also has $155,000 in outstanding student loans and they struggle to stay afloat, she said.

“The payment pause has been a blessing, we have been able to afford groceries, just the simple, little things,” Estrada said.

Once her loan payments pick back up, “it looks like I might be looking at a third job,” she added.

Among fully employed borrowers, 92% said they are concerned about being able to afford their payments due to rising prices, the Student Debt Crisis Center and Savi found.

“The ongoing pandemic combined with unprecedented inflation are huge obstacles for borrowers who are, by and large, not ready to resume payments, struggling to afford basic needs, and confused about their options moving forward,” said Natalia Abrams, the president and founder of the Student Debt Crisis Center.

For some, it may make sense to enroll in an income-driven repayment plan, she said.

These programs aim to make borrowers’ payments more affordable by capping their monthly bills at a percentage of their discretionary income and forgiving any of their remaining debt after 20 years or 25 years.

Alternatively, you may be able to request a deferment, which lets you put your loan on hold for up to three years, or a forbearance, which lets you temporarily suspend payments for up to one year. However, in this case, interest will still accrue.

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After two years of federal student loan payments being suspended because of the Covid pandemic, the government doesn’t expect an easy process to get millions of borrowers back into repayment.

That’s the takeaway from a new report by the Government Accountability Office, which found that as many as half of people with federal student debt may be at increased risk of delinquency.

The Education Department may also have outdated contact information for millions of borrowers, posing additional challenges to communicating about the resumption of payments, GAO found.

Even before the pandemic, the country’s outstanding student loan debt balance exceeded $1.7 trillion and posed a larger burden to households than credit card or auto debt. Roughly a quarter of borrowers, or 10 million people, were estimated to be in delinquency or default.

As of now, student loan payments are scheduled to resume in May. Here’s what borrowers worried about the change should know.

If you can’t afford to pay your bill

If you’re still unemployed or dealing with another financial hardship because of the pandemic, you’ll have options come May.

First, put in a request for the economic hardship or unemployment deferment, experts say. Those are the ideal ways to postpone your federal student loan payments, because interest doesn’t accrue under them.

If you don’t qualify for either, though, you can use a forbearance to continue suspending your bills.

But keep in mind that interest will rack up and your balance will be larger — sometimes much larger — when you resume paying.

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If you expect your struggles to last awhile, it may make sense to enroll in an income-driven repayment plan. These programs aim to make borrowers’ payments more affordable by capping their monthly bills at a percentage of their discretionary income and forgiving any of their remaining debt after 20 years or 25 years. Some payments are as little as $0.

To calculate how much your monthly bill would be under different plans, use one of the calculators at Studentaid.gov or Freestudentloanadvice.org, said Betsy Mayotte, president of The Institute of Student Loan Advisors, a nonprofit organization.

If you decide to change the repayment plan you had before the pandemic, Mayotte recommends submitting that application to do so with your servicer now.

“I have significant concerns that there will be some big servicing delays” when payments resume, Mayotte said.

What if my servicer is changing?

Three companies that serviced federal student loans — Navient, the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency, aka FedLoan, and Granite State — all recently announced that they will be ending their relationship with the government.

As a result, around 16 million borrowers will have a different company to deal with by the time payments resume, or not long after, according to Mark Kantrowitz, an expert on student financial aid.

Double-check that your servicer has your current contact information, so that you receive all the notices about the upcoming change, experts say.

Impacted borrowers should get multiple notices about their new servicer, said Scott Buchanan, executive director of the Student Loan Servicing Alliance, a trade group for federal student loan servicers.

Come May, if you mistakenly send a payment to your old servicer, the money should be forwarded to your new one, Buchanan said.

John B. King, Jr., who served as education secretary under former President Barack Obama, has joined a number of other leading government officials calling on President Joe Biden to cancel student debt through executive action.

King, who’s running for governor of Maryland, wrote in an editorial in Business Insider on Wednesday that the country’s outstanding student loan balance is “indisputably a crisis.”

“All too often, the crushing weight of student debt prevents people from even considering buying a home, beginning a family, or starting a new business,” King wrote.

King is not the only former U.S. Education Department official in support of cancelling student debt. Wayne Johnson, a senior student loan official under former President Donald Trump, resigned in 2019, saying the lending system was “fundamentally broken” and advocating for broad cancellation.

Even before the coronavirus pandemic, the country’s outstanding student loan debt balance exceeded $1.7 trillion and posed a larger burden to households than credit card or auto debt. Roughly a quarter of borrowers, or 10 million people, were estimated to be in delinquency or default.

Biden is also under pressure from Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who are pushing him to cancel at least $50,0000 per borrower.

“You don’t need Congress,” Schumer has said. “All you need is the flick of a pen.”

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Biden has asked the U.S. Department of Education to prepare a memo outlining his power to forgive student loans, but the agency has had that report for more than 10 months and its findings have still not been made public.

In January, 80 House and Senate members wrote a letter to Biden urging his administration to share that report and to immediately cancel $50,000 in student debt for all.

Critics of a student debt jubilee say it would be unfair to those who didn’t borrow for their education and who’ve paid off their loans, and that it wouldn’t significantly stimulate the economy because college graduates tend to be higher earners more likely to redirect their monthly bill to savings than additional spending.

There are reports of disagreement on the topic within Biden’s closest circle, and the president himself has questioned if providing loan cancellation to those who’ve benefited from a college education is the best way to buoy middle class families.

Still, a spokesperson for the White House said the president continues to look into what debt relief actions can be taken administratively.

Picking the right college has increasingly become a question of cost.

But not everyone is choosing the most economical option.

Since the start of the Covid pandemic, college enrollment has continued to sink. For the most part, community colleges are the hardest hit, followed by public four-year colleges, according to a report by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center based on fall 2021 data.

Meanwhile, the country’s most elite private colleges are faring better, despite the incredibly high price tags.

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Tuition and fees plus room and board for a four-year private college averaged $55,800 in the 2021-22 school year; at four-year, in-state public colleges, it was $27,330, according to the College Board. 

When factoring in other expenses, the total tab can be more than $70,000 a year for undergraduates at some private colleges.

At Massachusetts Institute of Technology, for example — one of the nation’s most expensive schools — tuition and fees, room and board and other student expenses came to more than $73,160 last year. The school was among several institutions that froze tuition during the height of Covid. A smaller number announced tuition discounts or even more dramatic tuition cuts.

Meanwhile, at the State University of New York, in-state students pay just $7,000 for tuition, or roughly $23,350 a year including room and board and other fees.

“This is not the same as $75,000,” said Nancy Zimpher, a senior fellow at the National Association of System Heads and the former chancellor of the State University of New York. “Our costs are high, not exorbitant.”

New York’s Excelsior Scholarship also covers four years of tuition for families that meet certain income thresholds. “When you talk about the cost of college and lump everything in there, it’s not a level playing field,” Zimpher said.

In fact, public colleges “educate the majority of the underserved student population,” Zimpher said. And as enrollment falls, the majority of the students opting out of college are from these low- and middle-income families. 

Most are wary of the costs and hefty student debt, which has only increased during the pandemic, according to a separate report by Fidelity Investments.

Outstanding student loans now stand above a stunning $1.7 trillion.

But there is another way.

The U.S. Department of Education awards about $120 billion every year to help students pay for higher education. And beyond federal aid, students could also be eligible for financial assistance from their state or college.

Yet fewer students are filling out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA, which serves as the gateway to all federal money, including loans, work-study and grants. Most say it’s because they didn’t think they would qualify, studies show. 

In total, the high school Class of 2021 left an estimated $3.75 billion in Pell Grants on the table by not completing the FAFSA, according to a recent report from the National College Attainment Network.  

“Never cross an expensive school off of your list of consideration based on sticker price alone,” said Robert Franek, The Princeton Review’s editor-in-chief. “Many of those schools are giving out substantial scholarships — this is free money.”

At some private colleges the average scholarship award is just over $50,000, The Princeton Review found, which brings the total out-of-pocket cost down to less than $20,000.

When it comes to offering aid, private schools typically have more money to spend, Franek added.

“The truth is, it could end up being less expensive than public college.”

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The U.S. Department of Education has announced it will cancel the student loans of nearly 16,000 borrowers who attended certain for-profit schools, including DeVry University. The relief comes out to $415 million in total.

“The Department remains committed to giving borrowers discharges when the evidence shows their college violated the law and standards,” said Education Secretary Miguel Cardona, in a statement Wednesday.

“Students count on their colleges to be truthful,” Cardona added. “Unfortunately, today’s findings show too many instances in which students were misled into loans at institutions or programs that could not deliver what they’d promised.”

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The department found that between 2008 and 2015, DeVry misled students by claiming that 90% of its graduates who actively seek employment obtained jobs in their field of study within six months of graduation. In reality, the job placement was closer to 58%, according to the department.

Donna Shaults, a spokesperson for DeVry University, said the school’s board and leadership have changed since the federal government first made the allegations.

“Nonetheless, we do believe that the Department of Education mischaracterizes DeVry’s calculation and disclosure of graduate outcomes in certain advertising, and we do not agree with the conclusions they have reached,” Shaults said.

So far under the Biden administration, more than 100,000 students allegedly defrauded by their schools have received loan forgiveness totaling around $2 billion.

Between sky-high costs and hefty student loan debt, more students and their families are questioning the value of a college degree.

While about 81% of college-bound juniors and seniors still see college as a worthwhile investment, only 42% of families feel confident about covering the cost, according to a report by Sallie Mae.

As a result, a growing number are opting out entirely. The number of undergraduates enrolled in college is now down 5.1% compared to two years ago, according to a separate report by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center — a loss of nearly 1 million students.

In fact, getting a diploma is almost always worth it in the long run, according to “The College Payoff,” a report from the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce.

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Bachelor’s degree holders generally earn 84% more than those with just a high school diploma, the report said — and the higher the level of educational attainment, the larger the payoff.

When broken down by areas of study, however, the difference is striking. 

These days, the top 10 best-paying majors are all related to engineering — with the exception of computer science, which ranks fifth out of all majors, according to the New York Federal Reserve’s recent study of salaries for college graduates. 

Yet there are colleges that don’t offer a decent return on investment at all, according to another study released by the Bipartisan Policy Center.

“There are institutions that don’t pay off,” Kevin Miller, the Center’s associate director of higher education, said of primarily smaller for-profit colleges.

“The student loan crisis makes it clear there’s a lot of money at stake,” Miller said. “If there’s something we can do to make it less likely someone will go into debt for a useless credential, we should be doing that.”

The College Transparency Act, which the House recently passed, aims to make it easier for families to measure the value of getting a degree and how it translates to job opportunities and salaries down the road. The Senate version of the bill is sponsored by Sens. Bill Cassidy R-La.; Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.; Tim Scott, R-S.C.; and Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I.

“We need to know if these degrees are really creating social and economic mobility,” said Nancy Zimpher, a senior fellow at the National Association of System Heads and the former chancellor of the State University of New York. 

“We have an economy where every penny counts,” she added. “We have an obligation to be very clear about the cost of college and the return on investment.”

However, there are a lot of other factors that can go in to determining the value of school, according to Eric Greenberg, president of Greenberg Educational Group, a New York-based consulting firm.

Emotional well-being and the quality of life should also be taken into account along with the cost, academic offerings, job placement, alumni networks and other preprofessional services, he said.   

Coming out of the pandemic, “students want a typical college experience.”

“There is no easy equation here,” he added. “One of the new realities is that return on investment is much more broadly defined now than it ever has been.”

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Throughout the pandemic, 529 college savings plans have only gained momentum — even as higher-education enrollment numbers sank.

In 2021, the average account size jumped to a record of $30,287, according to the College Savings Plans Network, or CSPN.

Total investments in 529s also reached a record $464.3 billion last year, up nearly 10% from 2020.

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There’s a reason these accounts have proved popular in an uncertain time: Not only can you get a tax deduction or credit for contributions; earnings grow on a tax-advantaged basis and, when you withdraw the money, it is tax-free if the funds are used for qualified education expenses such as tuition, fees, books and room and board.

Currently, 34 states and the District of Columbia offer a write-off for 529 contributions as a state income tax deduction or credit, according to Morningstar. 

However, it’s also important to assess each 529 plan’s fees, which may include account maintenance, asset management or other miscellaneous expenses, according to Rachel Biar, the chair of CSPN. “Sometimes you have to balance the fees of the plan with the tax benefits.” 

Virginia’s Invest529, one of the largest 529 plans in the country, recently announced it was cutting administrative fees by almost half, effective Jan. 1.

The plan, which oversees more than 3 million accounts, also experienced record education savings numbers last year.

As the accounts grew in size, it became easier to bring the costs down, according to Virginia529’s CEO Mary Morris.

At the same time, “this reduction reflects our continuous efforts to maintain one of the lowest 529 fee structures in the country and to offer the best chance for our families to meet their savings goals,” she said. 

“It’s certainly a trend we’ve seen across the country,” she added, of lowering fees.

To be sure, average fees have fallen substantially in 529 plans since the creation of the investment program back in 1996, according to Savingforcollege.com.

Now, total investment and administration fees generally range from zero to 2%, depending on how the accounts are managed. (Savingforcollege.com also has a comparison tool and fee study, which compares the 10-year total costs of all so-called direct-sold 529 plans.)

Although Virginia’s Invest529 already had very low fees, the reduction should save account holders about $3 million altogether, according to Morris.

“Every little bit helps,” she said.

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Under pressure from Democrats, advocates and borrowers, the White House is looking at actions it might be able to take to forgive federal student debt.

The country’s outstanding federal student loan balance exceeds $1.7 trillion, eclipsing credit card and auto debt. Average debt for a bachelor’s degree recipient has tripled over the last three decades, to $30,000 today from less than $10,000 in the early ’90s. A quarter or more of borrowers are estimated to be in delinquency or default.

There’s no precedent for sweeping loan forgiveness carried out by the government. Experts say the closest example may be when there was cancellation of the taxes due on forgiven mortgages in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis.

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On the campaign trail, President Joe Biden promised to forgive $10,000 in federal student loans for all.

Such a move would cost around $377 billion, and would reduce the number of Americans with student debt to around 30 million from more than 40 million today, according to estimates by higher-education expert Mark Kantrowitz.

Meanwhile, canceling $50,000 for all, which Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., are pushing for, would cost $1.049 trillion, Kantrowitz found. That much relief would leave just around 8 million Americans with student debt. Such moves likely would not help holders of private student loans.

To cancel all federal student debt would cost around $1.7 trillion, and there would be no more federal student loan borrowers. Although the number could quickly creep back up: Between 4 million and 5 million new borrowers enter the system each year.

The government’s expense wouldn’t match the amount in debt it canceled, largely because it didn’t expect to get all that money back, and especially not anytime soon. People can take decades to pay off their student loans and repayment troubles are common.

Long-term costs of broad cancellation would be the loss of $60 billion a year the government earns from the interest on federal student loans, Kantrowitz said.

It would probably also have to generate another $28 billion a year to repay investors who bought U.S. Treasurys that have reached their maturity date.

Those who buy those securities have been providing the government with the funding it uses to give out federal student loans.

Nearly 1 million fewer students have enrolled in college since the beginning of the pandemic.

Between the sky-high costs and hefty the student loan debt, would-be freshmen are struggling to see the value in a degree. At the same time, more companies are hiring workers straight out of high school, amid an ongoing labor shortage.

Nationwide, fewer students went back to school again this year, dragging undergraduate enrollment down another 3.1% from last year, according to a recent report by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center based on data from colleges.

The number of undergraduates in college is now down 5.1% compared to two years ago — a loss of 938,000 students, the report found.

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Community colleges, which usually see an influx of students during economic downturns, have been particularly hard hit by enrollment declines.

Even though community college is significantly less expensive, fewer students enrolled when Covid’s financial impact was at its worst.

Community college students likely are older, lower-income and often balancing work, children and other obligations, and they are also disproportionately students of color — all groups the pandemic hit especially hard.

Initially, congressional Democrats’ Build Back Better Act included a provision to make community college tuition-free for two years — a move President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden have been advocating since the campaign trail — but the legislation hit a wall after Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.V., said he would not vote for it.

“Free community college is no longer part of that package,” the first lady said at the Community College National Legislative Summit Monday.

“We knew this wasn’t going to be easy,” she added. “I was disappointed.”

Federal student loan forgiveness was also left out of the Build Back Better agenda.

A spokesperson for the White House said the president continues to explore what debt relief actions can be taken administratively.

In the meantime, Biden has extended the payment pause for student loan borrowers that has been in effect since March 2020. Payments are expected to restart in May.

On the upside, more students who enroll in college stay on to complete their degrees.

Now about 42% of students who start at a two-year school finish the program in six years, the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center found, an uptick from previous classes.

In comparison, 69% of students who matriculated at a four-year public university complete their degree within six years. The rate jumps to 78% for those who started at four-year private schools.

“This broad measure of performance for higher education as a nationwide system, including transfers among two- and four-year schools of all kinds, shows long-term improvements for students and colleges alike,” said Doug Shapiro, the executive director of the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center.

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The $1.7 trillion outstanding federal student loan market tends to get most of the headlines, but another type of education debt has also been on the rise: private student loans.

Many college students have likely heard about the financing option.

“Private lenders advertise all over, including on TV, radio and websites,” said higher education expert Mark Kantrowitz. “Some colleges have a preferred lender list.”

However, consumer advocates caution that the loans can be pricey with unforgiving terms.

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Here’s what you should know.

Why do people take on private student loans?

The cost of attending college has been rising steeply, with the annual price tag of a public college, including room and board, at more than $18,000 and more than $47,000 for a private one.

There are limits to how much students can take out in federal loans — the most an undergraduate can borrow in a year is $12,500 — and so many turn to private financing to finish covering their bill.

As a result, the $130 billion private student loan market has grown more than 70% over the last decade, according to the Student Borrower Protection Center.

Americans owe more in private student loans than they do for past-due medical debt or payday loans.

Should students ever borrow via private lenders?

People should consider taking out a private loan when they have reached the federal student loan limits and still need some education financing, Kantrowitz said.

But, he added, “borrowing private loans may be a sign of over-borrowing, so they should do so with caution.”

One rule of thumb is that students shouldn’t borrow more in college than they expect to earn as their starting salary.

You can look up annual average incomes for different occupations at the U.S. Department of Labor’s website.

Here’s what else to watch out for …

Federal student loans offer a variety of protections, including forgiveness programs and interest-pausing forbearances, that most private student loans don’t.

Most recently, federal student loan borrowers have been able to press the pause button on their payments for close to two years during the Covid pandemic, without interest accruing. That relief wasn’t extended to private loans.

“There’s also the prospect of broad student loan forgiveness, which may be limited to federal loans,” Kantrowitz said.

“We almost always advise against private loans,” said Betsy Mayotte, president of The Institute of Student Loan Advisors, a nonprofit. 

“If you cannot make the payments, the lender can sue to get access to wage garnishment, asset seizure such as bank accounts, and that’s for both the borrower and the co-signer.”

As Mayotte pointed out, many private lenders require students to get a co-signer who is equally liable for the debt.

If payment challenges arise, both people are on the hook.

“I hear from borrowers and co-signers weekly who cannot afford the payments and there’s just not any options I can give them,” Mayotte said.

Private student loans come with fixed and varying interest rates.

“Generally, borrowers should prefer a fixed rate in a rising-rate environment, even though the variable rates may start off lower,” Kantrowitz said. “Variable interest rates have nowhere to go but up.”

Either way, the rates on the loans can be pricey.

“I’ve heard of interest rates as high as 18% on private student loans,” Kantrowitz said.

When Kate Quick, 43, finished her master of fine arts degree at the University of Alaska Fairbanks 22 years ago, she had taken out about $30,000 in loans.

Now, she owes nearly $48,000, even after years of making payments.

“I just can’t think straight whenever I have to deal with student loans,” said Quick, who now works for the faculty union at the University of Alaska.

She also barely missed an opportunity for relief. Quick previously worked as a professor at the university, so she investigated Public Service Loan Forgiveness, or PSLF, a program that would forgive her debt because she worked in education.

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The program requires 120 qualifying payments, which takes about 10 years. The rules for what kinds of payments qualify, however, are strict. Although Quick worked as an adjunct and then a tenure-track professor for 17 years, only the payments she made while she was a full-time employee count toward the program.

She’s short of the 120 payments she needs to qualify, and she no longer works at an eligible employer. Now, she’s in a different career and sees few opportunities to return to teaching — she doesn’t want to go back to the university, and she is not certified to teach elementary, middle or high school.

In addition, Quick had to change her Federal Family Education Loans to direct loans when determining eligibility for PSLF. That added $17,000 to her principal.

Her monthly payments will also increase to $568 each month from $88. If she follows the current payment plan set by her servicer, she will end up paying roughly $170,000 to eliminate her debt. Her husband, a jewelry artist who went back to school to become a computer scientist, also has student loans and has a payment that’s more than $500 each month.

“It makes me panic,” she said, adding that because of student loans, the family has put off buying a house and saving for college for their three teenage children.

“It created some marital problems over the years because money is a thing that people fight about in relationships,” she said. “And, especially when you don’t have a lot of it, which was us.”

A common problem

Quick is not alone. More than 60% of borrowers say student loan debt has negatively affected their mental health, according to the CNBC + Acorns Invest In You Student Loan Survey conducted by Momentive. The online poll was conducted Jan. 10-13 among a national sample of 5,162 adults.

“When people aren’t able to pay their bills or their student loans as quickly as they should, there is a level of shame and sometimes guilt,” said Aja Evans, a licensed mental health counselor who works with Laurel Road, a digital banking platform. “That can quickly turn into feeling bad about yourself and not feeling like you can present who you truly are to other people because you’re worrying about the financial stresses in your life.”

The survey also found that the less an individual earns, the more their mental health suffers when it comes to student debt. Less than half of people who earn more than $100,000 annually said that education debt negatively affects their mental health, compared with 59% of those who earn between $50,000 and $99,000 and 70% of those who earn less than $50,000 each year.

Women and younger adults are more likely to report negative mental health effects of student loan debt, the survey showed. Still, more than half of baby boomers said their student debt had a negative impact on their mental state.

“People think student debt is a young person’s issue,” said Betsy Mayotte, president of The Institute of Student Loan Advisors, a nonprofit that helps student loan borrowers with free advice and dispute resolution. But that isn’t true, she said, pointing to millions of older borrowers who are struggling to pay down debt and save for retirement or are retired and still repaying loans.

Why student loan debt hurts mental health

There are many reasons why having student loan debt takes a toll on the mental health of borrowers. Many Americans with debt end up putting off other financial milestones, such as having a baby, buying a home, getting married, saving for retirement or even taking a vacation.

The system is also often confusing to navigate and, aside from not understanding how their loans work, many borrowers have trouble understanding their options for repayment and relief.

That confusion can lead to higher balances or other costly mistakes.

“A lot of people are on income-driven repayment plans that lower what they’re required to pay every month,” said Bridget Haile, head of operations at Summer, which helps borrowers navigate repayment. “The issue is that for a lot of people even if you make full on-time payments every month for years you will often see your loan balance go up rather than down.”

A growing balance, even as you’re making payments, is psychologically difficult to face, she said. In addition, if someone has defaulted or hasn’t been able to make consistent payments, it can hurt their credit score.

What’s next  

The moratorium on federal student loan interest and payments has helped millions of borrowers.

The Biden administration also relaxed rules for PSLF, making it easier for some borrowers to get forgiveness, and has wiped away all the debt of some borrowers, such as those who were taken advantage of by for-profit institutions.

Still, many borrowers aren’t sure how they’ll resume payments and have difficulty navigating the systems that may bring them relief. Currently, payments and accruing interest are set to start again in May.

Quick and her husband aren’t sure how they’ll make their monthly payments when they eventually restart.

“We’re both just pulling our hair out and wondering what to do, because we can’t afford a $1,100 a month student loan payment,” she said. “It just makes our heads spin.”

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Americans believe it’s more likely that some, or all, of student debt gets forgiven than that bills will resume in three months, according to a CNBC + Acorns Invest In You Student Loan Survey. (The online poll was conducted by Momentive between Jan. 10 and Jan. 13 among a national sample of 5,162 adults.)

Just 29% of respondents ranked student loans resuming in the spring as the most probable outcome. More than a quarter think the likelier situation is that the pause is prolonged beyond May, while 14% of people anticipate full loan forgiveness and another 28% expect some cancellation.

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When the U.S. Department of Education announced that it was extending the payment pause in August, it said that would be the final break. Yet it then announced in December that borrowers would get more time, citing concerns about the new omicron variant of Covid-19. The payment pause has now been extended five times.

“You can cry wolf only so many times before borrowers no longer believe that the payment pause and interest waiver are ending,” said higher education expert Mark Kantrowitz.

While the White House would likely prefer to restart payments and frame it as evidence of a recovered economy, there are political and logistical factors to weigh.

President Joe Biden is under intense pressure to forgive some of the debt, and turning on payments without doing so may signal to some that he’s abandoned that option just six months before the midterm elections.

Then there’s also the fact that after two years without student loan payments, many borrowers have gotten used to life without the bills.

Even before the coronavirus pandemic, the country’s outstanding student loan debt balance exceeded $1.7 trillion and posed a larger burden to households than credit card or auto debt. Roughly a quarter of borrowers, or 10 million people, were estimated to be in delinquency or default.

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This diverse population of student debt holders includes senior citizens and teenagers; high-earning professionals and low-income laborers; Republicans and Democrats. Still, there are some groups that are disproportionately impacted by student debt — especially women and people of color.

“$1.7 trillion, is close to 9% of the GDP of the entire country. That’s huge! That’s significant! And it really touches every American’s life in some way,” says Nicole Smith, chief economist at the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce. “But their long-term experience really depends on socioeconomic status. And it’s highly correlated with race, and it’s highly correlated with wealth, and whether you come from a high-income or low-income family.”

According to CNBC + Acorn’s recently released Invest in You Student Loan Survey conducted by Momentive, 68% of U.S. adults have debt, 15% have federal student loan debt, and women and people of color are disproportionately represented in these groups. Momentive surveyed 5,162 American adults between Jan 10 and Jan 13 online to get a better picture of the communities most impacted by student debt. 

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“Reflecting historical access to capital, more people of color and women have federal student loan debt,” explain Momentive researchers. About 24% of Black adults say they have federal student loan debt, compared to 15% of Hispanic, 14% of White, and 11% of Asian adults. 

Women (19%) are also more likely than men (11%) to have student loan debt, and this trend can be seen across races. In fact, the survey results suggest that 11% of white men, 17% of white women, 15% of Black men, 31% of Black women, 10% of Hispanic men and 19% of Hispanic women have student debt.  

These findings echo decades of work from student debt researchers. 

According to the American Association of University Women (AAUW), women hold roughly two-thirds of all student debt in the United States.

Data from the National Center for Education Statistics suggests that Black and African American college graduates owe an average of $25,000 more in student loan debt than white college graduates. Four years after graduation, 48% of Black students owe an average of 12.5% more than they borrowed and 29% face monthly student loan payments of $350 or more.

The Brookings Institution estimates that on average, Black college graduates owe $52,726 in student debt while white college grads owe closer to $28,006. 

And the Urban Institute reports that among borrowers between the ages of 25 and 55 who took on college debt to finance their own undergraduate degree, Black borrowers owe $32,047 on average, while white and Hispanic borrowers owe roughly $18,685 and 15,853, respectively.

Making clear who is most impacted by student debt is a crucial part of the student debt, and especially student debt forgiveness, conversation, says Smith. 

“Do you deserve to have some sort of assistance with going to school? That’s really the conversation about student loan forgiveness. Because when you hear objections to it, it has to do with, ‘Well, what about all these rich kids who are going to school to be doctors and lawyers? You know, do we subsidize their education, and they come out to be millionaires?” she says, referencing comments by people such as President Joe Biden, who said he would not forgive up to $50,000 of federal student debt because it would benefit “people who have gone to Harvard and Yale and Penn.”

“We end up driving the conversation by the tail end of the distribution,” explains Smith. “We’re having a conversation about the exceptions to the rule.”

Braxton Brewington, press secretary for The Debt Collective, a union organization that represents student debt holders, says this “misconception” about what groups are more impacted by student debt is often used “to justify someone’s opposition to cancellation.”

“Student loan borrowers look like — and are as broad as — the working class itself,” he says. 

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Economists say this mounting total worsens generational inequality, slows economic growth and exacerbates racial disparities. On a micro-economic level, borrowers also face serious consequences in their day-to-day lives. 

According to CNBC + Acorn’s recently released Invest in You Student Loan Survey conducted by Momentive, 81% of people with student loans say they’ve had to delay one or more key life milestones because of their debt. Momentive surveyed 5,162 American adults between Jan 10 and Jan 13 online to better understand the impact of student debt. 

The survey found that among student loan borrowers, 42% delay paying off other loans, 40% delay investing money, 38% delay saving for retirement, 35% delay travel, 33% delay buying a home, 16% delay having a baby, 14% delay getting married and 12% delay finding a new job. 

“Student loan debt prevents family formation, it prevents people from making decisions about their life, about purchasing a home, about buying their first car, about getting married, about having children,” lists Nicole Smith, chief economist at the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce. “And that wasn’t the purpose of student loan debt. Student loan debt was supposed to be good debt — the type that you take out so that you can invest in your human capital formation so that you can live your life afterward — and it’s morphed into something much more insidious.”

Momentive researchers found that the most common sacrifices made by borrowers varied slightly by age. For instance, those aged 35-64 were most likely to delay paying off other loans, while borrowers under 35 were most likely to delay buying a home or investing. 

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“The weight of student loans is a cloud that weighs over every financial decision, from your daily coffee to your big life decisions,” says Braxton Brewington, press secretary for The Debt Collective, a union organization that represents student debt holders. “So many people say they would start a business if they did not have student debt. So many people delay getting married because they don’t want their partner to take on the debt.”

Brewington says he has even spoken with borrowers who have rationed medication because of their student loan burden.

This dynamic in which student loan borrowers can’t save for the future, or for emergencies, makes for a less stable society, says Smith. 

Paying off student debt “first affects your ability to get the standard things that are often required to transition into adulthood: a house, a car and a family,” she says. “That’s what happens immediately. But on the back end of that… you often end up living on a razor’s edge. Because if there’s any eventuality, anything that happens outside of your equilibrium, you run the risk of bankruptcy.”

And for many people hoping to compete in the modern economy, attending college and taking on student loan debt can feel unavoidable. 

“On the one hand, here’s student debt, it’s a burden around your neck, it’s this anchor that’s weighing you down for the next X amount of years,” says Smith. “And we also know that for the past 40 years or so, at least since the advent of the personalized computer, education has been the arbiter of economic mobility and economic freedom.”

She continues, “and so you’re often essentially walking a tightrope between recognizing what needs to be done and understanding that there may be horrible consequences.”

LISTEN NOW: Should student loan debt be forgiven? What are the hidden costs of college? Should financial education start at an earlier age? CNBC reporters and contributors discussed these topics and more on Twitter spaces.

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“As soon as the election cycle got through, and he got in office, crickets,” said Ewing, 24, who lives in Cincinnati and owes close to $40,000 in student loans.

Along with Ewing, 57% of Americans say they want the president to make student loan forgiveness a priority, according to an CNBC + Acorns Invest In You Student Loan Survey, by Momentive. (The online poll was conducted January 10 to 13 among a national sample of 5,162 adults.)

More than a third of Gen Z and millennials believe student loan forgiveness should be a high priority for Biden.

Outstanding student loan debt in the U.S. has exceeded $1.7 trillion and poses a larger burden to households than credit card or auto debt. Roughly a quarter of borrowers, or 10 million people, are estimated to be in delinquency or default.

No historical precedent exists for the kind of sweeping student loan forgiveness the president is increasingly under pressure to provide by members in his party, advocates and so many borrowers who say the lending system is predatory and perpetuates inequality.

“Student debt is a policy failure,” said Thomas Gokey, co-founder of the Debt Collective, a national union of debtors. “We must cancel this unjust debt, which will also help build pressure to solve the root cause. We must fully fund public colleges and universities so that no one is forced into debt for an education in the future.”

The White House is currently weighing the legal and political risks of such a large move. An executive order canceling the debt could be challenged in the courts, possibly by Republican lawmakers, throwing the accounts of more than 40 million borrowers into limbo.

There are also reports that there are disagreements on the topic within Biden’s closest circle. The president himself has questioned if providing loan cancellation to those who’ve benefited from a college education is the best way to buoy middle class families.

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Yet progressives and advocates say the student debt crisis has caused the most pain to women, people of color and those who didn’t come from wealthy families who could foot the rising bills of a college education. And they warn that inaction will cost Democrats in the midterms.

“A lack of movement on student debt cancellation will result in the Democratic party’s base — young people, Black voters — staying at home,” Gokey said.

Recent polls show Biden’s approval rating among young people is on the decline.

Ewing, who studied environmental science at the University of Cincinnati and currently works at a daycare making $400 a week, said she feels frustrated and disappointed by both political parties.

“Neither side wants to help us,” she said. Although if Biden were to cancel student loans, she said, “I’d give him another term and stay with the Democrats.”

For Jeff Riesenmy, student debt cancellation is right up there with issues like climate change and income inequality that he wants to see Biden prioritizing. He currently owes around $170,000 in student loans, which, after more than a decade of payments, is still more than he originally borrowed because of interest charges.

“I don’t think people understand just how crazy it is,” said Riesenmy, 35, who graduated from Emory Law School in 2012.

Today he lives in Austin, Texas, and has a well-paying job as a product manager at a technology company, but his student debt feels insurmountable.

“This is by far the single major stressor in my life,” Riesenmy said. “It factors into every financial decision I make: Can I have a kid? Can I buy a house?”

The White House has repeatedly said it supports Congress drafting legislation to cancel student debt, but the odds of such a bill passing are near impossible, experts say. Even some Democrats don’t support broad loan cancellation.

Aware of this, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., have been pressuring the president to deliver the relief through executive order, arguing that he has the authority to do so.

“You don’t need Congress,” Schumer has said. “You just need the flick of a pen.”

Biden has asked the U.S. Department of Education to prepare a memo outlining his power to forgive student loans, but the agency has had that report for more than 10 months and its findings have still not been made public. Over 80 House and Senate members wrote a letter to Biden this month urging his administration to share that report and to immediately cancel $50,000 in student debt for all, which would cost around $1 trillion.

“It’s a cop out to punt to Congress,” Riesenmy said. “I don’t see much of an excuse for inaction at this point.” 

A spokesperson for the White House said the president continues to look into what debt relief actions can be taken administratively. In the meantime, Biden has extended the payment pause for student loan borrowers that has been in effect since March 2020. Payments are expected to restart in May.

Ian Rhodewalt, an educator and union employee, who lives in Amherst, Mass., said he believes student loan cancellation should be an “urgent priority” for the president.

He and his wife owe more than $130,000, and say the debt has their life on pause.

“We cannot buy a home because of student debt,” said Rhodewalt, 36, who graduated from Oberlin College in 2009 with a degree in creative writing and dance. He also is finishing a degree in labor studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

“It’s harder to make larger purchases, like appliances,” Rhodewalt said. “It also affects how much money we can put towards retirement.”

Rhodewalt helped to write a resolution calling on Biden to cancel student debt that was recently passed by the Western Massachusetts Area Labor Federation, a coalition of more than 60 public and private-sector unions.

“Student loan debt cancellation will be a big topic among unions,” Rhodewalt predicted.

“Working class people, when they seek any form of further education beyond high school, are more at risk of falling into the student loan debt trap and having their families anchored by debt for generations,” he said.

LISTEN NOW: Should student loan debt be forgiven? What are the hidden costs of college? Should financial education start at an earlier age? CNBC reporters and contributors discussed these topics and more on Twitter spaces.

SIGN UP: Money 101 is an 8-week learning course to financial freedom, delivered weekly to your inbox. For the Spanish version Dinero 101, click here.

Disclosure: NBCUniversal and Comcast Ventures are investors in Acorns.

Nearly one-third of undergraduates borrow money from the federal government to pay for college. That’s about 43 million Americans who owe a staggering total of nearly $1.6 trillion in outstanding student loans.

A new survey found that 54% of federal student loan borrowers said taking on that debt was not worth it. Overall, however, 44% said taking on that debt was worth it, according to the CNBC + Acorns Invest In You Student Loan Survey, done in partnership with Momentive. (The online poll was conducted Jan. 10-13 among a national sample of 5,162 adults.)

Yet, many millennials and Gen Xers are far more skeptical. Some 63% of respondents ages 35 to 44 said, considering their current situation, it was not worth it to take out federal student loans. 

The average loan amount for federal student loan borrowers is $36,510.

Kate Bernyk, 39, finished graduate school nearly 15 years ago with two communications degrees and about $100,000 in student debt.

“I used to be really proud that I had a master’s degree, but now it feels a little bit foolish,” said Bernyk, a New York-based senior communications specialist. “It feels like maybe I shouldn’t have gone because it’s really hard to put a price on what  the advantage has been versus the disadvantage of getting into debt.”

She still owes more than $30,000 in student loans. 

A bachelor’s degree holder earns a median of $2.8 million during their career — 75% more than if they had only a high school diploma — although when broken down by gender, women with a BA have median lifetime earnings of $2.4 million, compared to $3.3 million for men.

Loan repayment pause ending

Borrowers got a reprieve from federal loan payments when the Covid-19 pandemic hit in March 2020. That relief has since been extended five times and is now set to end in May. The payment pause has given many borrowers more money to use for everyday expenses (48%) and pay other debts (35%), the survey found.

Yet, when federal loan repayments resume, one-third or more of the borrowers surveyed said they’ll have to delay other financial goals, such as paying off other debts (42%), investing money (40%), saving for retirement (38%) or buying a home (33%). 

“It’s like a mortgage without the house at the end of it,” Bernyk said.

The potential drag on the economy is one reason supporters of student loan forgiveness, like economist Kristen Broady, are pushing for more.

“If people don’t have to pay back that money,” said Broady, a fellow at the Brookings Institution, “that’s more money that they can spend on durable and non-durable goods or services. That money goes directly into the economy.”

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A majority, or 57% in the survey, said they believe President Joe Biden should make student loan forgiveness a priority, but views are mixed on how to do it. 

About a third of respondents said all student debt should be forgiven, nearly the same amount said forgive loans for only those in need and about one in four said there should be no forgiveness.

Biden campaigned on a proposal to forgive $10,000 in student debt. Some Democratic lawmakers, including Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Majority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., are calling on the President to cancel student debt up to $50,000.

However, Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., the top Republican on the House Education and Labor Committee, said blanket loan forgiveness would be a “massive mistake” — and the extension of the student loan pause has already cost taxpayers over $150 billion.

Overwhelming to think about

Denisse Quintanilla, a CNBC intern and first generation college student, plans to graduate in May. She is unsure what the terms of her loan will be once she will have to begin making payments.

“It’s still overwhelming to think about how much I should be paying each month in order to not be into my 30s or early 40s and still have my student loan debt,” Quintanilla said.

While students may receive counseling when they first borrow the money, financial aid expert Mark Kantrowitz says it often falls short.

“Every dollar they borrow is going to cost them two dollars by the time they repay the debt, and they don’t really think about that,” he said. 

Bernyk, who held jobs at non-profits and in government for over 10 years, has had a great deal of time to think about and try to tackle her student debt burden. She may have found a solution to get to the finish line. 

Last fall, the Biden administration eased requirements to qualify for public service loan forgiveness. Bernyk said she’s been working with her loan servicer to qualify under this federal program to have her remaining loan balance wiped clean. The new rules are in effect until Oct. 31, 2022.

LISTEN NOW: Should student loan debt be forgiven? What are the hidden costs of college? Should financial education start at an earlier age? CNBC reporters and contributors discussed these topics and more on Twitter spaces.

SIGN UP: Money 101 is an 8-week learning course to financial freedom, delivered weekly to your inbox. For the Spanish version Dinero 101, click here.

Disclosure: NBCUniversal and Comcast Ventures are investors in Acorns.

Over 80 House and Senate members wrote a letter to President Joe Biden on Wednesday urging his administration to publicly release the memo outlining his legal authority to cancel student debt.

The president requested the department to prepare that report last year.

The lawmakers, including Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., also called on the president to immediately forgive $50,000 per borrower. The price tag on such a move would be around $1 trillion and 80% of student loan borrowers, or 36 million people, would have their debt cleared entirely.

Outstanding student loan debt in the U.S. has exceeded $1.7 trillion and poses a larger burden to households than credit card or auto debt. Roughly 10 million borrowers are likely in delinquency or default.

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Since March 2020, when the coronavirus pandemic hit the U.S., the Education Department has paused student loan payments. That relief has since been extended five times and is set to end in May.

The lawmakers said Americans shouldn’t be forced to resume the payments.

“In light of high Covid-19 case counts and corresponding economic disruptions, restarting student loan payments without this broad cancellation would be disastrous for millions of borrowers and their families,” they wrote.

Biden has asked both the U.S. Department of Education and the U.S. Department of Justice to prepare memos on his legal authority to cancel student debt. Schumer and Warren have insisted the president has the power to do so. The White House is likely weighing the legal risks of such a move.

Most experts agree that the chances of Congress passing legislation to deliver the relief are close to zero, as even some moderate Democrats oppose loan forgiveness.

A spokesperson for the White House said the president continues to look into what debt relief actions can be taken administratively.  

Yet it’s unclear why the reports on the his power to do so haven’t been released yet. The lawmakers point out in their letter that the Department of Education has had its memo for nearly 10 months.

“The digital SAT will be easier to take, easier to give, and more relevant,” says Priscilla Rodriguez, vice president at the College Board, in a statement. “We’re not simply putting the current SAT on a digital platform — we’re taking full advantage of what delivering an assessment digitally makes possible. With input from educators and students, we are adapting to ensure we continue to meet their evolving needs.”

The new digital test will still be scored out of 1600 but will be shorter and should take two hours instead of three. Organizers say this will give test-takers more time per question and that new shorter reading passages will cover a wider range of topics. 

Calculators will now be allowed on the entire math section and students and educators should get scores back in days, instead of weeks. No. 2 pencils will, of course, no longer be necessary. 

Representatives for College Board are optimistic that the changes will improve the test experience and make cheating more difficult. “With the current paper and pencil SAT, if one test form is compromised it can mean canceling administrations or canceling scores for a whole group of students,” reads the press release. “Going digital allows every student to receive a unique test form, so it will be practically impossible to share answers.”

The changes come as the test-optional movement has gained momentum. Following the 2019 Varsity Blues scandal, many questioned the advantages that wealthy students benefit from throughout the college application process, including around standardized testing. And during the pandemic, test-optional policies were adopted by a wide range of colleges and universities.

The Common Application reports that the share of colleges that require standardized test scores decreased dramatically from about 55% during the 2019-2020 academic year to just 5% during the 2021-2022 academic year.

“In a largely test-optional world, the SAT is a lower-stakes test in college admissions,” says Rodriguez. “Submitting a score is optional for every type of college, and we want the SAT to be the best possible option for students.”

Still, some say the changes may not be enough, pointing to research that has repeatedly found that wealthy students and white students earn higher SAT scores compared to their low-income and Black peers. 

“We should be eliminating standardized testing… We’re in favor of open admissions policy,” says Braxton Brewington, press secretary for The Debt Collective, a union organization that represents student debt holders and advocates for students. “This sounds like a tweak to make things better but there’s still a problem when we have standardized testing that has been proven to have racist results.”

In the announcement, College Board stressed that the organization is “working to address inequities” especially regarding access to technology.

College Board says if a student does not have a personal or school-issued laptop or tablet, College Board will provide devices to use. 

Furthermore, “If a student loses connectivity or power, the digital SAT has been designed to ensure they won’t lose their work or time while they reconnect.”

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These are strong, unexpected words coming from a college professor and economist. To be clear, I’m not saying anyone should give up on getting a college degree. But there is a much cheaper college route — and it doesn’t require becoming indentured to a ruthless, unforgiving lender, namely Uncle Sam.

Think about it: How many of us would borrow at a high to super-high interest rate for the opportunity to invest in something with a 40% chance of a complete loss? Not many.

But 18-year-olds face these odds when they borrow for college. Two in 5 will enter the hallowed halls of academia only to drop out. The majority will have borrowed for the privilege. As for college graduates, over two-thirds will leave in debt.

Parent PLUS loans are burying families in college debt

Outstanding student loans now total $1.7 trillion — larger than credit card debt. Some $100 billion constitutes borrowing by parents on their children’s behalf.

These “parent” loans likely represent additional borrowing by the children as the parents either guilt their children into repaying or extract repayment in the form of leaving a smaller bequest to their children.

Given that the true borrower of “parent” loans is unclear, no one knows the full extent and distribution of informal plus formal student debt. Today’s college students are graduating with close to $33,000, on average, in formal student loans. About one in seven formally owe over $50,000.

Uncle Sam is now charging college students interest at 3.74% on their borrowing, up to a four-year maximum of $32,500. But there’s no limit on what he will lend to “parents.” And the current rate on “parent” loans is 6.28%! That’s over four percentage points higher than what Uncle Sam pays when he borrows long-term.

How to attend college and not go into excessive debt

It’s more than possible to get a college degree without directly or indirectly borrowing potentially crazy large amounts at crazy high rates.

There are thousands of colleges and universities. Find one that’s cheap. That may mean attending a community college for three years and transferring to a better school as a senior.

Or you can work for a couple of years to save up for college and establish the fact that you are independent of your parents and shouldn’t lose grants or scholarships because of their income.

Another option: Attend community college, but simultaneously taking inexpensive online graded courses that provide certificates. A range of elite schools, including MIT, Harvard, Stanford, and my employer — Boston University — offer such courses.

For example, if you’re a resident of Iowa, you can get a University of Iowa degree for less than $25,000 per year and an online Yale education. The extra costs to study online at Yale, with completion certificates including grades? Next to nothing.

Then, in applying for jobs, you can state on your resume that you graduated from Iowa, but studied at Yale. This is worth codifying a secret: Get the best of both worlds — a cheap, debt-free degree and a super expensive education.

Do what it takes, short of borrowing, to attend college if that’s your goal. But also know that two-thirds of Americans are leading full and highly productive lives without the aid of a college diploma lost in a box in the attic.

Do your research

If you’re from a low- or middle-income family, colleges with high prices may end up being cheap because the net price they would charge you is very low. It’s important to comparison shop to understand each school’s net price.

Parents need to take steps early to limit at least the specific assets, if not the income, that will raise their children’s net college price given what enters the government’s needs-based formula.

And applicants must form their own research-based rankings of the departments of interest in the schools to which they apply. National rankings lists are popularity polls; they aren’t serious comparisons of research excellent — which, in the end, is the basis of outstanding teaching.

As for Uncle Sam…

It’s time for Uncle Sam to stop exploiting America’s youth for trying to get a higher education.

I believe that students should be allowed to borrow on the same terms as Sam lends long-term (i.e., at the 30-year Treasury bond rate). And student loans should be treated the same as other I.O.U.s when it comes to refinance and discharge through bankruptcy.

Yes, this will mean lower proceeds from bleeding students dry. But Uncle Sam can content himself with helping destroy our children’s climate and leaving them official and unofficial fiscal obligations far beyond their capacity to pay.

That’s surely sufficient malfeasance and malevolence for any good uncle. 

Laurence J. Kotlikoff is an economics professor and the author of “Money Magic: An Economist’s Secrets to More Money, Less Risk, and a Better Life.” He received his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1977. His columns have appeared in The New York Times, WSJ, Bloomberg and The Financial Times. In 2014, The Economist named him one of the world’s 25 most influential economists. Follow Laurence on Twitter @Kotlikoff.

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For years, many student loan borrowers have suffered under the weight of excessive debt.

Some 66,000 borrowers finally got relief when the recent Navient settlement erased their balances. (Here’s how to know if you’re one of them.)

Millions more may never experience that kind of debt cancellation.

Although federal student loan borrowers have the option to pause their monthly bills without interest until May 1, federal student loan forgiveness on a broader scale is looking less likely since it was left out of Democrats’ Build Back Better agenda.

There are, however, other ways to get a break, although they may come with a catch.

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For starters, borrowers can take advantage of the payment pause, for now, and consider whether to consolidate or refinance their outstanding loans.

If you have several different loans, consolidating could help streamline and simplify your payment into one monthly bill.

You could also choose to extend the terms beyond the standard 10 years to lower your monthly payments. Although, if you extend the term of the loan, you ultimately will pay more interest on the balance.

However, if you’re under an income-driven repayment plan, or if you’ve made payments toward public service loan forgiveness, consolidating your current loans could cause you to lose credit toward those programs.

The Biden administration has relaxed the rules around public service loan forgiveness with a limited waiver, which means some of your past payments may now count toward loan forgiveness. This temporary waiver entitles more borrowers to the cancellation, but must be completed by Oct. 31, 2022.

Otherwise, you could refinance your student loans at a lower interest rate to decrease your debt load.

“If you have private loans, nothing should stop you from refinancing if you find a lower rate,” said higher education expert Mark Kantrowitz. “You just want to be careful not to refinance into a variable rate because those have nowhere to go but up,” he added.

Private loans may be fixed or may have a variable rate tied to Libor, prime or T-bill rates, which means that when the Federal Reserve starts to raise rates from essentially zero, borrowers with private loans will pay more in interest, although how much more will vary by the benchmark and the terms of the loan.

“With the Fed about to raise rates, you definitely want to stay in a fixed-rate loan,” said Mary Jo Terry, a managing partner at Yrefy, a private student loan refinancing company.

You also want to be careful not to refinance a federal loan into a private one, which would mean losing out on any federal loan forgiveness — if it is ultimately enacted by Congress. 

Refinancing to a private loan would also forgo the safety nets that come with a federal loan, including income-based repayment programs, for those who would qualify.

To see if that applies, go to the Department of Education’s central database for student aid to check the terms for your loans and all the federal programs available to you.

There’s even a loan simulator, which helps you calculate student loan payments and choose the repayment option that is best.

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The top staff investigator for the House Select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol was fired from his position as the top attorney for the University of Virginia by the state’s newly elected Republican attorney general.

A spokesperson for Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares indicated that the removal of Timothy Heaphy from his position was routine. Heaphy was on leave while working for the Jan. 6 panel.

“It is common practice for an incoming administration to appoint new staff that share the philosophical and legal approach of the Attorney General,” Victoria LaCivita, a spokesperson for Miyares’ office, said in a statement to CNBC. 

However, Democrats do not see it that way. Virginia state Sen. Scott Surovell told The New York Times, “This is purely payback for Jan. 6 — there is no other reason that makes any sense.” 

A spokesperson for the Democratic Party of Virginia told CNBC that the organization viewed the attorney general’s decision to fire Heaphy as a “shameful attempt to whitewash the incidents of January 6th and appease his far-right allies.”

“Virginians deserve an attorney general that will serve as the people’s lawyer for the Commonwealth — not one who is beholden to the rioters of Jan. 6,” the spokesperson’s statement said.

On Jan. 6, 2021, supporters of then-President Donald Trump attacked the U.S. Capitol, interrupting a joint session of Congress gathered to certify Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 presidential election.  

In Virginia, the attorney general oversees general counsel at colleges and universities that make up the state’s public higher education system, according to the Times.

But Surovell told the Times the decision to remove a university lawyer is normally left to the school’s leadership. 

In a statement to the Associated Press on Monday, LaCivita said Heaphy had been a “controversial” hire and the “decision was made after reviewing the legal decisions made over the last couple of years.” 

LaCivita told the Times that the attorney general wants the advice of the general counsel to be based on law and not the university’s philosophy. “The decision had nothing to do with the Jan. 6 committee or their investigations,” LaCivita said. 

Heaphy earned both his bachelor’s degree and his law degree from UVA and has been the school’s top attorney since 2018. The Times reported he is a registered Democrat and served as a U.S. attorney for the Western District of Virginia during the Obama administration. 

In 2017, Heaphy published a highly critical independent review on behalf of the city of Charlottesville of how the police handled the violent white nationalist rally that led to dozens of injuries and the death of a woman.

Heaphy’s firing comes less than two weeks after Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin was inaugurated. 

The University of Virginia, the Jan. 6 select committee and Heaphy’s office have not responded to CNBC’s requests for comment.

There was a great deal of interest in the recent news that Navient, one of the largest student loan servicers, would be canceling the debt of 66,000 borrowers.

The main question people had: Am I one of them?

Probably not, is the short answer.

Just around 0.15% of the country’s student loan borrowers will get their debt cleared from the settlement between the lender and dozens of states.

Navient was accused of giving out loans to those who couldn’t afford to repay them. Under the agreement’s terms, another 350,000 federal student loan borrowers will get a small check in the mail from the company.

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Navient has denied all allegations.

“The company’s decision to resolve these matters, which were based on unfounded claims, allows us to avoid the additional burden, expense, time and distraction to prevail in court,” said Navient’s chief legal officer Mark Heleen, in a statement.

Here are the details of the settlement, including who will actually get the relief.

Which loans will be canceled?

Eligible borrowers include those who hold subprime private student loans, which are given to people with low credit scores, from Sallie Mae (Navient’s predecessor company).

To qualify, those loans also had to be taken out between 2002 and 2014, your mailing address must be in one of the states that participated in the settlement and you must have been in delinquency for at least seven months.

Another group that will get the cancellation are those with private student loans from Sallie Mae who attended certain for-profit colleges that have faced federal or state law enforcement action.

Navient should contact impacted borrowers by July 2022.

Who will get a check?

Among the accusations made against Navient was that the lender steered some consumers into costly forbearances rather than helping them to find a more affordable repayment option.

As a result, the company is required to write a check for approximately $260 to some 350,000 borrowers.

To qualify for the payment, you also have to meet a number of other requirements. Those include: You were enrolled in at least two consecutive years of forbearances between October 2009 and January 2017, you entered repayment before January 2015 and at least one of your federal loans was eligible for a payment plan that caps bills at a share of your monthly income.

The restitution should be paid out sometime in the spring.

Do I have to do anything?

No. The financial relief will be automatic.

“However, borrowers should make sure the loan servicer has their current contact information,” said higher education expert Mark Kantrowitz.

You likely won’t owe any taxes for the cancelled debt or $260 payment, Kantrowitz said.

So what’s going on with broad forgiveness?

On the campaign trail, President Joe Biden vowed to deliver “immediate cancellation of a minimum of $10,000 of student debt per person.”

More than a year into his first term, however, there’s been little mention of forgiveness.

At a recent press conference, a reporter asked the president if he still planned on cancelling student debt. He didn’t answer.

Loan forgiveness has also been left out of Democrats’ Build Back Better agenda.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment.