I’m a student in the Human Service field, I feel forced to take out loans because my mother is the only other person helping me pay for my education and she is a single mother.

While I was at my 2-year school, both of my parents ended up paying for half of my tuition while I worked my brains out and paid for the other half myself.  My mom can’t help me out anymore because of the tuition hikes, which forced me to take out loans in the middle of the semester to cover the tuition.  It’s not ideal but it’s better than dropping out.  

Well, in general CUNY and SUNY tuition hikes are detrimental to lower class students who rely on the lower tuition for their advanced education. Because of the hikes, students are having to resort to increasingly drastic measures to make up the money.

In my case, I’ve been penny pinching since middle school so I’ve accumulated enough savings to pay through undergrad out of pocket. However the tuition (and especially the hike) has had me reassess my financial situation to see what I’ll have to cut and what I’ll have to do in order to afford it. Since on top of paying for school, I live alone and basically have been living self-sufficiently. On a side note I’m living almost exclusively on white rice to keep a monthly surplus.

I am currently in $33,000 of student loan debt, and I’m one of the lucky ones, as I know of people whose debt far exceeds that amount. There was never an option of paying out of pocket as I, nor anyone in my family can afford the astronomically high amount it cost to attend school.

The constant rise of tuition is a serious issue for all students as it is pricing out lower income families from a higher education. Even those currently receiving the Excelsior Scholarship could lose it and be faced with this hike.