Oregon senator offers possible solution to rising student debt

There is a student debt crisis in our country and as an instructor here at Mt. Hood, I see my students dealing with it every day. Nationwide, two-thirds of students graduating from college in 2011 had student loan debt. The average amount of that debt was $26,600. Here in Oregon, 63 percent of students have student debt and the average is $25,497. As an adviser, I’ve had conversations with students around financing their education, but advice is all I can provide and the final decision on whether to take out loans and what amount to use rests with students and it can be an extremely difficult decision.

Outstanding student debt in the U.S. is now more than $1 trillion and earlier this year, the Federal Reserve identified this mounting debt as a risk to household spending. Not only is rapidly increasing student debt delaying the purchasing of cars, homes, and other items, delaying the economic recovery, it is preventing students from saving money for the future. This not only creates an immediate crisis, but a future crisis as well.

As a legislator, there are several ways that I am working to help ease the burden of student debt. First and foremost, I continue to fight for more funding for higher education. When funds to our colleges and universities are cut, financial aid is often one of the first targets. By restoring funding to higher education, we can ensure that financial aid funding is increased. Second, I support increased funding for programs like the Oregon Opportunity Grant and working to identify new programs or methods for providing financial aid. Third, I’m using my position in the legislature to draw more attention to this issue, and that is why I introduced House Joint Memorial 19.

HJM 19 calls on Congress to support U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s Bank on Students Loan Fairness Act. Sen. Warren’s bill would prevent the interest rate on federally subsidized Stafford loans from doubling on July 1 and would instead, for one year, institute an interest rate of 0.75%. This interest rate is the same rate available to big banks when they borrow from the Federal Reserve discount window. This would last for one year, with the idea that Congress would use that additional time to improve the student loan system.

There is no easy solution to the student debt crisis. What we need is a combination of fully funded higher education and financial aid budgets; the job market to stop demanding four-year degrees for jobs that do not need them; and the continuation of the search for better college financial aid models that do not rely as heavily on student loans.

The only way to accomplish these steps, however, is by keeping pressure on legislators in Salem and Washington, D.C. Students and their families need to continue to contact their legislators and demand increased funding for higher education and financial aid and they need to vote for people who want to increase funding this funding. There is no substitute for our constituents contacting us with their priorities. If the federal government is going to continue to encourage students to go to college, it needs to start putting students and their families before big banks and corporations.