Damian Papworth

Laugh if you must, but things are getting harder for students these days. While going to university for your parent’s generation might have been an exception to the rule, more and more people are expected to apply for entry-level jobs with at least a bachelor’s degree. The paradox of this shift from vocational school and life experience to post-secondary education is that more and more students are graduating each year with the same qualifications. So it’s entirely possible that you can, in fact, study Russian literature for four years and be qualified only to make coffees or stock books.

More than just a snide joke that those successful business students crack at the expense of clueless liberal arts majors, the pressures of students are more and more real. First, there is the inflated sense of importance of getting into a good school that starts as early as junior high, and usually kicks in particularly strong in high school. Guidance counselors report more and more children under the age of 18 who are, quite simply, freaking out about their futures, even though they are technically still children. The amount of essays, standardized tests, and then additional standardized tests that are required to apply to university are overwhelming and somewhat mind boggling for high school students.

It’s not that students shouldn’t be paying attention to their future, it’s that worrying that much at a young age drains many students of the ability to worry productively, something that they will most likely need at some point during their twenties. Many psychologists and counselors agree that by putting this much undue pressure on youngsters, you are actually doing them a disservice, because they are essentially worrying about something that does not require that much energy while things are right around the corner that actually do.

The most important thing to focus on: paying that student loan debt. It’s not something that goes away once you have a degree, rather, it’s something that kicks right in. And students, especially those who have never had to pay a loan before, are going to be in for a big surprise when they find out that no sort of nice conversation can convince a debt collector otherwise.

This time to pay back loans comes right after graduation, for which many students had to do a great deal of work, including preparing a thesis and completing vast loads of coursework. In the rush of all of the final touches of student life, many forget the fact that the real obstacle out there in the real world is getting a job and not getting swallowed up in debt, and that process can start just months into life in the real world.

This sort of life transition is hard enough when there’s a surplus happening, but in such a dismal economy, every little misstep can lead towards an even more dismal fate. For those who are not going to immediately find work, it can be devastating to learn that a business degree would have helped, but knowing a computer skill would help even more. Add to that the fact that so much of a liberal arts education actually puts a focus on how great it is to overthink everything, and you have overthinking, underqualified 20-somethings running around, screaming in existential terror. Not a pretty picture, indeed.

So after all of the pressures associated with attending school–balancing a job and work, excelling in courses, making sure you actually get the course load you need to complete the degree you want–there is now the added pressure of crippling debt looming right overhead. Students who applied to university three years ago had no idea they would be receiving their degrees amidst one of the worst recessions the world has seen in recent times, and that getting a job would be a lot more difficult than they realized.

As much pressure as students have been experiencing since grades began to get inflated and landing a spot in a freshman university class became an epic endeavor, the new world that awaits them after graduation is even more stressful. Because while a professor might excuse a late paper, it’s going to be a lot more difficult to convince someone from a collection agency to do the same thing if your entry-level job is not providing you with enough money to live comfortably and pay off your student loans.

Damian Papworth understands from experience, how a college consolidation debt loan can help alleviate one of colleges pressures, money. He offers free information on the subject at the College Consolidation Loans website

categories: student pressures,student loans,students,education,debt,loans,money,jobs,careers