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If you are reading this article you probably are asking yourself this question, “Should I go to community college?”
Or, maybe you went to college already and you are looking to see what a family member/friend who is about to go into college should do!
Either way, this article offers a different perspective on the conventional, “Go to school, get good grades, work really hard to be successful,” advice most young adults heard in high school.
So whether you are kicking the idea around to try your hand at community college or maybe you are just doing some research to see if the price of admission for college is worth it, by the end of this article I hope to help you find what you are looking for.
Note: This is the second blog post I ever wrote, so truth be told it is a little “Raw.” Just a little. If you are new to MLW, check out our story here.
Should I go to community college?
Table of Contents
After dealing with paying off over $200,000 in student loans over the past four years my initial answer as to whether you should go to community college is overwhelmingly…
YES! You should.
Without knowing someone's exact situation, in most cases community, college is the best bet for most young adults.
Sure, there are those who earn scholarships to four-year schools, join ROTC programs, and use other financial resources that make a 4-year degree affordable. However, for many, college has become way too expensive.
However, simply going to a community college for two years then transferring can eliminate up to 50% of student loans.
Student Loan Issues
Here is what I do know about college in general:
In 2016 the average college graduate had roughly $36,000 in student loan debt. An individual with that sort of college debt is looking at about $300-$350 payments for the next years and somewhere in the neighborhood of roughly $10-15,000 in interest. So if going to community college for two years allows you to save even a 1/3 of that, you are in a much better position come post-graduation time.
The average Bachelor's degree now takes 5 years not 4. So if you are basing your college tuition costs off of 4-year figures… well, think again. Chances are if you decide to change your major or you forget to take a class, you could be going for longer. Which leads to #3…
Most times an 18-year-olds are not ready to declare a major… they're 18. Asking an 18-year-old who just graduated high school and was still forgetting to bring a pencil to class to all of a sudden choose a “Major,” aka career path, for the rest of their life is about as stupid as it comes. Sure some can do it, but for the most part, 18-year-old kids are not in a position in life to make that kind of decision.
So while those three points address a little bit of the debate between community college and a four-year degree, I want to share the numbers I ran and compared had my wife went to community college instead of getting her doctorate.
Note: This is not a jab saying my wife doesn't deseve her education, we are very grateful and she earned it! This is an article that offers perspective for those considering going to community college instead of taking out thousands in student loans. (In case you were wondering, this was just my rough calculations and my wife loves being a Physical Therapist, so this is all hypothetical).
Should you get an Associates or Doctorate?
Sometimes my wife and I wonder what it would be like had she just gone to Community College.
After paying off $160,000 in student loans over the past 2.5 years it has actually become a common question, but we are not the only people asking it.
Student loan debt has reached an astronomical 1.6 trillion dollar deficit, with 72% of graduates having some sort of college debt.
The rising costs don't appear to be stopping anytime soon, in fact, college tuition continues to rise. Pair the rising costs with the conventional wisdom that says to our younger generations that the golden ticket is to graduate from college and you can sometimes have a recipe for lots of student loan debt.
However, both my wife and I followed this conventional wisdom, which meant we took out student loan debt. So I decided to see what the financial breakdown would have been like had my wife just gone to community college.
First, I am not a hater of college, I have two degrees in education and only had about $40,000 in loans to work off (I do find it funny I say only). While I find the value in a college degree, a larger problem lies in the belief that our younger generations should excessively take out student loans without any seconding guessing just to pursue “Their passion.”
Please… at 18 my passion was video games, fast food, and instant messaging girls.
Secondly, does it REALLY make sense to go to school for five years out of state to get a teaching degree and take out a $130,000 in loans to do so? Or did you really need the 5th edition of the biology book that cost $368 at the bookstore, (After interest $650), or could the school just let you use the 4th edition?
All this leads me to say:
Research College Funding!
With the costs of college tuition rising daily, it is vital that we slow down and think before jumping into boatloads of student loan debt. College doesn't have to cost a fortune. Just doing a little research and calculating costs vs return is vital.To prove my point, let’s just take my wife’s case for example. Had she not gone to college for 8 years and pursued her doctorate what could have happened?
Hypothetical Associates Degree:
Instead of a Doctorate in Physical Therapy, what if my wife pursued an associate's to become a registered nurse. As a community college student, she could have lived at home, worked full or part-time, and completed her studies at night.
Based on a conservative starting salary for a nurse and the costs of a community college now (In 2006 it was significantly less) I compared her fictional nursing degree to her actual path:
Cost Break Down:
These numbers and figures are my wife's student loan situation (On the right) as of 2015. On the left the “What if community college” game. As you can see at age 26, had she pursued the nursing path, with a 2-3% annual raise she could have earned approximately 283,000 when you factor out the cost of community college.
Even scarier, most of her loans are actually in between 7-8% interest. An interest rate of 7% on a principal balance that high makes paying down debt REALLY challenging. After graduation, she had to settle for income-based repayment, which didn't cover the monthly interest.
In fact, in March of 2017 when her loans capitalized, the principal increased $11,000 for the graduate loans and $6,000 for the undergrad loans.
All hypothetical yes, but just google the median salary of an RN and you will quickly learn that in 2016 it was about 65,000. I used very conservative numbers to illustrate my point in the table above.
Had Lauren simply went the nursing route, practiced part-time while she was in community college, and at age 20 started practicing full time she could have earned approximately $283,000 during the time she spent in “real” college. In addition to the earnings as a nurse, combined with the debt she took out to be a DPT it was essentially a $648,000 swing.
(You have to factor not only student loans but 4-5 years of not earning money when assessing college – Read my 5 rules about money here).
Like a blocked field goal returned for a touchdown in football, instead of going up 3-0 all of a sudden you're down 7. Based off these rough figures, after 30 years of making at least $21,000 more as a Physical Therapist my wife will finally break even.
Unless… we pay off her loans as fast as possible.
Q: What is your take, is community college a better choice?
Josh writes about ways to make money, pay off debt, and improve yourself. After paying off $300,000 in student loans with his wife in less than five years, Josh started Money Life Wax and has been featured on Forbes, Business Insider, Huffington Post, and more! In addition to being a life-long entrepreneur, Josh and his wife enjoy spending time with their chocolate lab named Morgan, working out, being outside, traveling, and helping others with their finances! I got serious with money when I used Personal Capital to track my finances.
Great post, and it would be useful for high school guidance counselors to share this info with students before they go off to college.
I do believe in the value of education, and I think college is worth it. However, I agree with you that there are many ways to reduce the costs of that degree! Community college can be an excellent starting place to reduce costs if you plan to pursue a degree that requires additional schooling. Why not attend community college for two years and then transfer? Although there is a lot of competition to get into colleges and universities as an incoming freshman, the story is completly different for transfer students! There are many scholarship and grant opportunities for transfer students. As you said, also, why pay extra for a degree from an expensive private institution that you can get for less at a state school? In the end, employers only care that you have the degree, they do not care where it came from.
It would be helpful to see a comparison between the potential earnings of a nurse and a DPT in general. Nursing is a good paying field, but so is PT. And with a DPT, wouldn’t one have the option of going into business, which offers the possibility of making even more money? Starting a PT business could open up more opportunities for deferring income in tax sheltered retirement funds – more than what the nurse could do working for an employer.
Just something to think about, I totally agree that student loan debt is crazy out of control.
I whole heartily agree that more counselors should show students these sort of articles. So many think they have to go to school to have any success, one of the biggest marketing pitches of colleges!
As an educator and a person with a higher ed. degree I value my education and I do think it is beneficial. We just need to make sure we are not letting teenagers potentially set themselves back as a society.
Because we are paying off our student loans, my wife will come out on top as a DPT. However, she has friends who are not paying off loans and they are using the IBR plan. Their loans are rapidly increasing in interest every month, making the chances of them paying them off even harder. At the end of the day, my big question is do we want out medical professionals saddled with debt and stress?
I love the cost benefit analysis and comparison. Very helpful. When I speak of debt free college I inevitably get the “what about a doctor” argument. You make a great case.
My hope is that you two met in college. Totally worth every cent.
Hey Tim, it is a rough comparison but it gets the point across. I sometimes feel bad slamming high valued degrees just because WE NEED great DPT’s, MDs, DDS, lawyers etc but I hate it costs THEM so much to go help OTHER people. Not sure how but it would be cool to see a way how social workers, counselors, teachers, possibly even doctors could do some sort of program out of high school that is more cost effective (Since PSLF doesn’t really work)
Hmm… instead of considering if your wife went to community college I wonder what it would look like if YOU did instead… seems a little sexist. She’s as deserving of a higher ed college education as anyone else.
Thanks for commenting, I think you might have missed the point on this one. This article was about the cost long term of going to grad school vs going to community college.
If my schooling had been different I am sure I would have thought otherwise, but that wasn’t the case. Sorry if the title through you off. My wife is very deserving of her degrees, hence why she got them, but she will tell anyone $270,000 in student loans is A LOT!
First time reader, so I don’t know the whole situation. But why are you calculating your wife’s degree and not your own. Like her career choice and schooling choice are interchangeable but yours are not. Your education and your career have no more value than yours.
I would start with this, it tells the whole story: About MLW
My undergrad and Master’s was $40,000. If I was in the same position ($270,000 in student loan debt for a higher ed degree) the title would have been What If “I” Went to Community College Instead.
Great post, and it would be useful for high school guidance counselors to share this info with students before they go off to college.
I do believe in the value of education, and I think college is worth it. However, I agree with you that there are many ways to reduce the costs of that degree! Community college can be an excellent starting place to reduce costs if you plan to pursue a degree that requires additional schooling. Why not attend community college for two years and then transfer? Although there is a lot of competition to get into colleges and universities as an incoming freshman, the story is completly different for transfer students! There are many scholarship and grant opportunities for transfer students. As you said, also, why pay extra for a degree from an expensive private institution that you can get for less at a state school? In the end, employers only care that you have the degree, they do not care where it came from.
It would be helpful to see a comparison between the potential earnings of a nurse and a DPT in general. Nursing is a good paying field, but so is PT. And with a DPT, wouldn’t one have the option of going into business, which offers the possibility of making even more money? Starting a PT business could open up more opportunities for deferring income in tax sheltered retirement funds – more than what the nurse could do working for an employer.
Just something to think about, I totally agree that student loan debt is crazy out of control.
Hey,
I whole heartily agree that more counselors should show students these sort of articles. So many think they have to go to school to have any success, one of the biggest marketing pitches of colleges!
As an educator and a person with a higher ed. degree I value my education and I do think it is beneficial. We just need to make sure we are not letting teenagers potentially set themselves back as a society.
Because we are paying off our student loans, my wife will come out on top as a DPT. However, she has friends who are not paying off loans and they are using the IBR plan. Their loans are rapidly increasing in interest every month, making the chances of them paying them off even harder. At the end of the day, my big question is do we want out medical professionals saddled with debt and stress?
Thanks for commenting!
I love the cost benefit analysis and comparison. Very helpful. When I speak of debt free college I inevitably get the “what about a doctor” argument. You make a great case.
My hope is that you two met in college. Totally worth every cent.
Hey Tim, it is a rough comparison but it gets the point across. I sometimes feel bad slamming high valued degrees just because WE NEED great DPT’s, MDs, DDS, lawyers etc but I hate it costs THEM so much to go help OTHER people. Not sure how but it would be cool to see a way how social workers, counselors, teachers, possibly even doctors could do some sort of program out of high school that is more cost effective (Since PSLF doesn’t really work)
Hmm… instead of considering if your wife went to community college I wonder what it would look like if YOU did instead… seems a little sexist. She’s as deserving of a higher ed college education as anyone else.
Hi Ash,
Thanks for commenting, I think you might have missed the point on this one. This article was about the cost long term of going to grad school vs going to community college.
If my schooling had been different I am sure I would have thought otherwise, but that wasn’t the case. Sorry if the title through you off. My wife is very deserving of her degrees, hence why she got them, but she will tell anyone $270,000 in student loans is A LOT!
First time reader, so I don’t know the whole situation. But why are you calculating your wife’s degree and not your own. Like her career choice and schooling choice are interchangeable but yours are not. Your education and your career have no more value than yours.
Hi Jess,
I would start with this, it tells the whole story: About MLW
My undergrad and Master’s was $40,000. If I was in the same position ($270,000 in student loan debt for a higher ed degree) the title would have been What If “I” Went to Community College Instead.