Officially student loan debt free

[jryoung]

That triggers a whole other lawyer rant - folks who somehow after they hear about the risk and make the choice to proceed anyway somehow seem to think the risk went away and behave consistent with their clueless re-write of reality.

What do you mean I'm liable, I talked to a lawyer.

 

[Nick87]

i feel like a kid that grew up with parents who mismanage their money or were spoiled, regardless of income, still won't learn much from a high school financial literacy class. though it certainly stands a good chance to help.

That's true and I speak from experience.

 

[Nick87]

I took economics in HS. My classmates were mostly college bound students. Small class.

The problem with requiring financial literacy is that it only helps those students who want the knowledge. Government was mandatory in the state I graduated HS. I bet 50% of my class still doesn’t understand the American political structure or the Electoral College.

I'll bet 50% of them probably don't remember or understand a lot from High school. I totally understand what your saying and agree for the most part. But if that's the logic then why send any kid who doesn't want to go to school?

 

[brymoore]

A thought banks will still loan with a co-signor? not exactly up to speed on it lately and over the last 10yrs things might have changed. Sallie Mae is still around and a google search for student loans has a lot of ads.

Student Loan Application Made Simple

Sallie Mae private student loans come with competitive rates and no upfront fees.

www.salliemae.com

Dead Link.

I really, really doubt banks are lending on student loans but you never know.

Here’s a great video showing Congress itself doesn’t understand student loans and that major banks have been out of student loans since around 2010.

 

[brymoore]

I'll bet 50% of them probably don't remember or understand a lot from High school. I totally understand what your saying and agree for the most part. But if that's the logic then why send any kid who doesn't want to go to school?

My argument is don’t make financial literacy mandatory. It should be available to those who want to take the classes. Financial literacy is not a core curriculum like Math and English.

 

[Nick87]

My argument is don’t make financial literacy mandatory. It should be available to those who want to take the classes. Financial literacy is not a core curriculum like Math and English.

Yes and my argument is that 7 years of music could probably be trimmed and replaced with some more worthwhile life skills. While a kid may not be interested in any of those at the time they're going to soak up at least some info from it. Even if they soak up 30% of what a kid who is interested in it it's a hell of a lot bigger net positive to than lip singing or blowing into a flute for 7 years. I don't think kids who don't have any financial guidance at home are going to be too interested and those are the ones who could benefit from it the most if even a small percent.

 

[perma]

My argument is don’t make financial literacy mandatory. It should be available to those who want to take the classes. Financial literacy is not a core curriculum like Math and English.

For the sake of debate, what percentage of students do you believe would opt to take such class voluntarily?

 

[brymoore]

For the sake of debate, what percentage of students do you believe would opt to take such class voluntarily?

Got me. What’s your guess?

It’d be a moving number based on the demographics of the school area. Silicon Valley schools might see higher participation while Compton schools might have lower.

 

[perma]

Got me. What’s your guess?

It’d be a moving number based on the demographics of the school area. Silicon Valley schools might see higher participation while Compton schools might have lower.

I’m sorry, it wasn’t meant to be a ‘gotcha’ question, I was genuinely curious.

I didn’t have a lot of electives in school. It was between art or welding for me personally, so with that POV, there’s a good chance I would have.

My guess would be less than 15% of students, seniors specifically. Those that are interested would probably be in business school. The old man in me just says ‘you don’t know what’s good for you’.

 

[PawPawWPG]

High school principal here. Michigan is mandating personal curriculum as a graduation requirement for the current 8th-grade class on. My school already offers Dave Ramsey’s curriculum as an elective and about half our students go through it.

The issue (as someone who just finished paying off an immense amount of student loans in our family) is that 17 year old kids don’t understand how money “scales.” It’s hard to understand the difference between a $40,000 and a $80,000 salary if you’ve only worked at Walmart or a local restaurant, and there’s no way for them to understand what the loan payments are going to do to their take-home pay.

We try to push trades or the military as much as college.

I don’t have a good answer but I put a lot of blame of colleges for massively increasing costs and over-exaggerating ROI on degrees, but how can you blame them when high school students can literally take out as much as they want in loans to pay for school?

 

[perma]

High school principal here. Michigan is mandating personal curriculum as a graduation requirement for the current 8th-grade class on. My school already offers Dave Ramsey’s curriculum as an elective and about half our students go through it.

The issue (as someone who just finished paying off an immense amount of student loans in our family) is that 17 year old kids don’t understand how money “scales.” It’s hard to understand the difference between a $40,000 and a $80,000 salary if you’ve only worked at Walmart or a local restaurant, and there’s no way for them to understand what the loan payments are going to do to their take-home pay.

We try to push trades or the military as much as college.

I don’t have a good answer but I put a lot of blame of colleges for massively increasing costs and over-exaggerating ROI on degrees, but how can you blame them when high school students can literally take out as much as they want in loans to pay for school?

I’m very surprised your school has that much interest in personal finances. That’s amazing to read.

What types of students do you typically see go through Ramsey? Do they traditionally have (I guess we’ll call it) good financial upbringing from home?

 

[PawPawWPG]

I’m very surprised your school has that much interest in personal finances. That’s amazing to read.

What types of students do you typically see go through Ramsey? Do they traditionally have (I guess we’ll call it) good financial upbringing from home?

It’s a midlevel math credit for seniors currently - our high fliers take AP Calculus and our seniors just trying to graduate take Consumer Math.

We’re a pretty solid community and our students reflect that so it’s mostly kids who have parents that probably follow Dave’s advice but don’t make enough to pay for their kids college, if that makes sense.

 

[thusby]

Congrats! That’s a game changer, now you can open up your finances and start building some liquid investments.
Took me about 10 years as well.

 

[SFC B]

That's true and I speak from experience.

I went almost directly the other way...until the last couple of years when I have finally settled into a completely secured income stream that is inflation adjusted (with 2 more income sources coming at 60 and 62) and spent some on myself, I have been a VERY frugal guy (at least for me and household expenses, not as much for the kids). This was as a result of living a childhood that imploded because of poor financial decisions. My parents divorced when I was 8 because of my dad spending 3 dollars for every 2 he made (he was an auto body guy and did make decent money). Went from living in a nice little house in the suburbs to apartments in shitty neighborhoods with my mom and the POS she married. I would say we went from being middle class to the very low end of working class. "Things" were very few and far between (zero extras of any kind) and food was really just enough with some meals missed. Mom died when I was 15 and I had to go live with dad and the POS HE married. Lived in the ghetto with them until I went to college. I vowed to always find a way to be financially SECURE. To know where every paycheck was coming from, how much it would be, to have insurance.....basically to get away from the gut wrenching uncertainty I had witnessed for 10 of my 18 years.

 

[mdhunter61]

My wife and I had a combined $50k. Made the final payment today. Took us 10 year. Damn good Friday and damn good way to start the new year.

What a way to start 2024!! Congrats to you and the wife, that's an achievement to be proud of.

 

[BrentD]

I don’t have a good answer but I put a lot of blame of colleges for massively increasing costs and over-exaggerating ROI on degrees, but how can you blame them when high school students can literally take out as much as they want in loans to pay for school?

Ah, no. Just plain no.

I just cut and deleted a long diatribe that you probably would not want to read. But suffice it to say, that's a pile of misleading BS.

 

[Hawk Tuah]

Congratulations. That is awesome

 

[Hawk Tuah]

High school principal here. Michigan is mandating personal curriculum as a graduation requirement for the current 8th-grade class on. My school already offers Dave Ramsey’s curriculum as an elective and about half our students go through it.

The issue (as someone who just finished paying off an immense amount of student loans in our family) is that 17 year old kids don’t understand how money “scales.” It’s hard to understand the difference between a $40,000 and a $80,000 salary if you’ve only worked at Walmart or a local restaurant, and there’s no way for them to understand what the loan payments are going to do to their take-home pay.

We try to push trades or the military as much as college.

I don’t have a good answer but I put a lot of blame of colleges for massively increasing costs and over-exaggerating ROI on degrees, but how can you blame them when high school students can literally take out as much as they want in loans to pay for school?

You've created a great school culture as principal.