Thanks to StudentLoanJustice.org, a national
grassroots advocacy organization and political action committee, students
from all over have banded together to speak out about the sticky student
loan situation. Two central Illinois members share their stories:
A local biology professor, who wishes to remain
anonymous, began her career with a full-ride scholarship to Saint Louis
University. She graduated in 1995 and enrolled in a Chicago medical school.
After two years, she decided to switch directions. She took time off school
and went on to receive a master’s degree in biochemistry from the
University of Missouri-St. Louis in 2005.
She took out loans for both medical school and
graduate school, and after graduation faced a total debt of nearly
$160,000. She attempted to move all of her loans from Sallie Mae to Great
Lakes Higher Education Corp., but one of the specialized loans
wouldn’t transfer. Each month she sends $426 to Great Lakes and $200
to Sallie Mae.
She dealt with the biggest nightmare, she says,
before she made the decision to go to UMSL.
“I was trying to find a job where I could
afford these payments,” the biology professor says. “I started
to tutor, had a couple of research positions, and waited tables, but it
just seemed like I never made enough to pay them and pay everything else I
owed, like rent and other bills.
“It got to the point where I couldn’t
afford to live, so I filed for bankruptcy. I was very young and naïve,
and I didn’t see any other way out.”
She didn’t know that her student loans
weren’t dischargeable in bankruptcy and now on her credit report she
has a bankruptcy that did little to alleviate her situation.
In hindsight, she says, she sees problems with the
expense of education and with loan companies’ reluctance to help
students erase their debt.
“I was taking out massive amounts of loans when
I was younger,” she says, “and I thought it would be easy for
me to pay them back. You don’t realize how many things are just
expensive.”
Wilma Washington of Charleston classifies herself as
a nontraditional student.
In 1980 she took out a $2,500 loan to fund a
bachelor’s degree in political science at Eastern Illinois
University. She was a single mom raising two kids, and when she got
pregnant with her third child two years later, she decided to leave EIU.
“I was struggling, trying to work, and I just
gave up,” Washington says. “You know the story of a single mom,
uneducated, trying to raise three children. That was my life.”
She filed for bankruptcy and moved to Louisiana. When
she returned to Illinois in 1990 and reapplied for EIU, she received notice
that her loan was never discharged and that its total had ballooned to
$9,000. Since so much time had gone by, she says, her loans had defaulted
and she wasn’t granted a deferment. Instead her wages from
housekeeping and customer service jobs were garnished and her income tax
was taken.
The loan’s interest continued to accumulate.
After she was taken to court, attorney’s fees were added to the mix.
“I continued to work like I have, do my income
taxes, and let them take it,” Washington says. “That was the
only way I was getting it knocked down — it wasn’t going to go
anywhere, it was only continuing to grow.
“But in 2004, they were satisfied. After paying
over $18,000 on an original $2,500 loan, they discharged it.”
Now that she doesn’t have kids at home anymore,
Washington has decided to go back to school for a degree in geriatric
nursing. She took out $6,000 in student loans and started at EIU on June 8.
She’ll take out more in the fall to cover living expenses, but says
she’s not worried this time.
“By the time I finish my degree and pay back my
loans, I won’t have this problem,” Washington says. “Now
it’s more worth it, because I’m more focused than I was. Under
no circumstances will I let it go into default.”
— Amanda Robert
This article appears in Aug 14-20, 2008.
