The other higher-education financing problem to address

Proposed federal government student debt forgiveness has attracted much attention. It is controversial because many people opted to forgo college and its costs, or they repaid their college debts.

For example, I enlisted in the U.S. Army to pay off my undergraduate debt. Regardless of people’s opinions about student debt forgiveness, after many students graduate from high school in coming weeks they will confront another higher-education-financing-related quandary when they go to college. That issue relates to course loads students often have to carry to qualify for many forms of educational aid.

Although the system of higher educational funding in our country is hardly straightforward, it is often the case that students must register to take at least 12 credits (usually four courses worth 3 credit hours each for a full course load) to receive substantial forms of aid from the federal or state government.

This policy is fine for students who, like me when I was in college, don’t work many hours weekly beyond time devoted to their college studies. In fact, research shows that taking a full load can help with retention and reduce the amount of time spent pursuing a degree.

However, according to researchers at Temple University and the City University of New York, taking a full course load can create significant problems for students whose lives are more complicated. For example, if students work at a job more than 30 hours a week, squeezing a full course load into their lives can be problematic.

These research findings are consistent with what I have seen in my professional experience going back to when I first started teaching college students full-time in 2007. Sometimes these students are busy caring for ailing relatives, raising offspring or siblings, or working full-time jobs, and gambling that getting a degree quickly matters more than a genuine record of academic engagement and excellence.

For students with these formidable extracurricular responsibilities, the full course load requirement for many forms of financial aid becomes a binding, one-size fits all, straitjacket they wear before they can slip into a cap and gown for graduation. As a result, these students often struggle academically and end up with health problems that could have been avoided if they were allowed to exercise greater discretion based on their insight into their own particular situation. Of course, students could often enroll for just a class or two and pay out of their own pockets up front, but they are often tempted to bite off more than they can chew if they can defer the costs of doing so into the future.

While allowing students greater flexibility to take less than a full course load would probably result in fewer fulltime students, it seems likely that overall demand for credit hours would not decline based on increased demand from students better able to pay for part-time credit hour loads with greater government help.

Thankfully other government programs are not so confining. For example, I have used my Veterans Affairs’ benefit to help purchase a home, but I can imagine the foolish choices it could encourage if we could only get assistance to buy houses with larger monthly payments than would be wise to embrace. In such cases, veterans would be tempted to take on more than they could handle.

As a first-generation college graduate, I am particularly concerned about such students. I remember relatives stressing the importance of getting a college diploma, as if it were a winning lottery ticket.

In reality, performance in classes and internships is important for not only knowledge or skills acquisition, but also how strong performance and recommendation letters can facilitate important job opportunities. I knew that, but it seems like too many students do not.

When students do not recognize this reality, they may graduate with a diploma, but without the kind of job prospects that will allow them to earn enough to easily repay educational debts they willingly incurred.

Dr. Paul Vasquez has taught political science and international relations courses at the University of Central Florida since 2011.