Wednesday, May 7, 2014

Music Inspires Tuition Discussion

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With finals in full throttle, I decided to keep this week’s post on the lighter side.  Many people use music – maybe a certain artist or Pandora station – to immediately turn their brain onto study mode.  But some students are using music to stir up student loan discussions.  One of Beyoncé’s newest hits Partition has enlivened the topic of tuition (see, it rhymes).
 Chanel Carroll says she “just wants to lead a debt free life” as she faces off against Sallie Mae in her Beyoncé parody TUITION.  She illustrates the strain for some students who are hounded by private loan companies – comparing them to the mob – because of accepting additional financing for their education despite having scholarships and doing well during school – a problem faced by many graduates.  Private lenders often have higher interest rates than the government direct loans and do not offer the extensive grace periods, repayment options, and protections that government direct loans provide.  Try to avoid this situation by shopping around for the best loans or avoid taking out loans altogether.
Another parody of Beyoncé’s Partition, focuses on the rates at which colleges set their tuition costs.   Cruella de Coco in Tuition is fearful of “paying off loans until she’s sixty” and pleads colleges to lower their tuition rates.  She says, “I thought the point of college was to get that green, not to be livin off pork and beans.”  And, she’s right – that used to be the notion of going to college.  Many students graduate and feel that they didn’t receive their end of the bargain.  It’s important, now more than ever, to do your research, perform a cost-benefit analysis for going to college and decide whether the degree of your choice will give you the return on your investment.
If you remember back to my post on selling ad space to pay off student debt, these women may have come up with another creative alternative to decreasing their student debt burden.  In some cases, YouTube videos that produce enough hits will receive advertising and can earn money off of clicks.  Keep being creative and continue the student debt discussion!

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