Back to Table of Contents | Back to Main Index
Previous Cover Stories | Send mail to The Voice


Some students learn how to break out of the college-debt jail cell

The transmission on Sarah Slagle's car went out two days before she returned to Multnomah Bible College for her second year. She rode to MBC on a bus, carrying only one suitcase. When she arrived at Multnomah, she said she remembered looking at her school bill and the money she had on hand and seeing a big difference between the two. She said, "I remember standing at window B, looking at Cindy, looking at my [bill] and just going, 'What am I going to do? I have no idea what's going to happen. Logically, this doesn't work.'"

She remembered feeling panic and wondering if she would need to leave school and return to her home in Redding, Calif.

She felt she had no other option but to get a loan, but she questioned if she was doing the right thing. She knew God wanted her at Multnomah ultimately, but she wondered if he wanted her at Multnomah right then.

"I just wanted to be sure I finished college," she said. "That was the goal I had my whole life -- to finish something like that." Miss Slagle said she knew that if she stopped attending school to save money for college, she might never return.

Despite working 20-30 hours a week during school and full-time during school breaks, Miss Slagle still took out $11,000 in loans.

Now, two years after her graduation in 1998, Miss Slagle said her loans "haunt me. I hate having [the debt] hanging over my head. I feel so burdened by it. I don't feel free to go on vacations and spend money at a restaurant." She said the words constantly in her mind are, "I owe money. . . I owe money."

Miss Slagle now works as the office assistant in Multnomah's recruitment office. She takes home $950 to $970 a month. With her loan payments and other bills, Miss Slagle barely makes her payments from month to month: $300 of her paycheck goes toward rent, $100 toward tithe, $100 toward her school loans, $50 toward savings, $50 toward car insurance, $140 toward car payments, $160 toward food, gas and toiletries, and $50 toward spending money, which equals $950 a month.

But soon, Miss Slagle's loan repayment will jump from a $75 monthly minimum to $150. She has decided to return to her home in California and work for her parents' company. Miss Slagle will receive higher wages and her parents' company will help with her school loans.

"I'm tired of not being able to buy a Coke," she said. "I stopped buying soda just because that's a few extra dollars I can use a month. I cancelled my cell phone, which only cost me $17 a month, just because I needed the extra money. I sometimes get frustrated that I graduated from college two years ago, not just a few months ago, and I still can't buy a new pair of shoes if I wanted to."

Miss Slagle is not the only person to graduate from Multnomah with school debt. According to Dave Allen, MBC's director of financial aid, the average student graduates from MBC with $13,000 - $17,000 of debt. Some graduate students leave MBC with $30,000 - $50,000 in loans. The national average of undergraduate debt is $7,594 for four years of public college and $10,000 of debt for private college. according to James A Anderson's article, "Taming Your Student Loan."

What do these figures mean in the life of a student? According to the Financial Aid Student Guide, the standard repayment of a $10,000 loan is $123 per month. Over a 10-year period of time, interest will add nearly $5,000 to the original loan. For a person taking out a $50,000 loan, repayment is $600 a month.

Rich Willey, a 1995 MBC graduate, took out nearly $16,000 in loans in three years. His monthly payments are $165. Compounded with $8,000 of credit card debt, his bills became too much for him. Three years after graduation, Mr. Willey moved in with his mother. "It was really hard being 27 or 28 years old and moving back home," he said.

Not only did his debt load force him to move home to minimal financial obligations, but his loans also still prevent him from going into youth ministry, which was one of his majors at MBC. He said at the time he graduated, the average youth pastor made $18,000 to $20,000 a year. He needed to make $25,000 a year.

Ellen Bascuti, a 1992 Multnomah graduate, graduated with $8,000 in loans. Although her monthly payments of $65 have had little effect on her life, she is still paying off the loan eight years later.

Students can do little things before graduation to help pay their student loans, according to Miss Slagle. She said she spent much of her education making plans and expecting God to bless them. She said she never gave her finances to God. "Maybe God had wanted to bless me with money," she said. "I never asked him. [I] just went ahead with my plans. My plans were always very logical. They were the right and responsible things to do. But I didn't show faith. I realize that now. First ask God."

Miss Slagle also believes that people persevere when they know their burden will end. She said students need to keep the end in sight while trying to get through school. "If each semester, you're killing yourself working, just know it will be over. Just do whatever it takes -- even if that means not going out with someone because you have to work. It will be a sacrifice but worth it," she said.

Mr. Willey suggested students put God first by tithing. "Because I felt so strapped, I felt I couldn't tithe," he said. He said that God blesses him now that he's made tithing a priority.

"If you get in over your head, don't be afraid to go to the creditor and try to work something out," Mr. Willey said. He suggested Consumer Credit Counseling Service. "By not trying to work something out, you get into more trouble," he said.

Mr. Willey also suggested that students refrain from purchasing unnecessary items such as CDs and pizza. "It comes back and gets you eventually," he said.

Mrs. Bascuti suggested that students look into grants and scholarships to help finance their education.

The biggest mistake students make is not realizing that schooling costs money, Mr. Allen said. He said students assume "that somebody, somehow is going to pay their whole bill."

Mr. Allen suggested students work 10-15 hours a week during school. According to the research he has done on student employment over the last 20 years, students who work 10-15 hours a week tend to get higher grades than those who decide against working. More than 20 hours of work tends to negatively effect students' grades.

Students should work full time during summer and breaks, and, possibly work a second job, too, Mr. Allen said. "If school is a priority, then probably summer work can be a priority," he said.

He said students need to pay off loans as soon as possible; couples who marry during college and combine their debt should especially focus on paying off the loans quickly.

What can students who are looking into low-paying ministry expect?

"I worried about Multnomah students because they go into ministry, which tends to not be as high paying," Mr. Allen said. But according to Mr. Allen, Multnomah students have a lower default percentage than the national average. Last year, 1.7 percent of MBC students defaulted, the year before that 2.4 percent defaulted, the year before that 0 percent defaulted. The national average on defaulted loans is 9 percent.

"That tells me God is able to provide for [students'] needs," Mr. Allen said. "They have to approach the loan as part of the ministry. If they're going to take a loan, they are going to have to trust that God will help them deal with that loan. I don't think this gives them a license to borrow willy-nilly. I think they need to be prudent, but if they are doing their part, it seems to me, by looking at those default rates, God is doing his part."

Mr. Allen said the most a dependent student can borrow is $23,000 over four years. "To buy a new, moderately priced car would not be very much different than that," he said. "Which is the more valuable? Some people would not hesitate to buy a $23,000 car and make payments. So, if you put it in that kind of perspective, a $23,000 loan maybe isn't that big of a deal."

Sarah Slagle is both scared and excited about moving back to Redding, Calif. She said the whole process of deciding whether or not to move has been a battle. She fears the unknown. She fears being lonely. Most of her friends live in the Pacific Northwest. She said the Sarah who moved from California five years ago is different than the Sarah who is returning.

Yet the very things that trouble her are the very things she's excited about. She said she is learning to trust in God rather than in herself or in her friends. She said she needs to learn that God is not limited by geography. "I want life to be hard and challenging because that's what it takes for me to depend on God," she said. "I don't do it naturally. He has to take things away from me to make me turn to Him and want Him more than anything."

"I thought, while I was going to school, that life would just settle down and be more stable and normal once I graduate and that everything would fall into place," she said. "I realized after graduation that was just not true. I still have hard times. I'm still busy. I still look to the future and not at what God has for me and the things he is teaching me. Something magical doesn't happen when you walk across the stage [to get your diploma]. Life is still there. God is still there."

Miss Slagle hopes to get involved in relief work once she pays off her loans. She said she doesn't regret coming to Multnomah, although she sometimes wonders if she had made the right choice financially. "I would do it all over again," she said. "I don't regret coming here."