NEWS: ACADEMICS
students are provided with the best possible learning environment,” the post read. Kolberg said potential solutions for the student debt crisis besides canceling debt could be putting a cap on interest rates on student loans. Depending on what level of education, the U.S. Department of Education’s student loans have interest rates of 3.73–6.28% at a fixed rate. This means that the interest rate of the loan stays at the same rate for the duration of repayment. However, some students like Hugonnet have to take out private student loans, which have variable rates. This means the interest rate of the loan can change throughout repayment. The average interest rate on private student loans can be anywhere from 0.94 – 11.98%. Loans with high risk of repayment failure are called subprime loans, which are commonly distributed by private lenders. This can put students with lower credit scores at risk of predatory lending, as subprime loans are harder to repay. “You have to watch out for predatory businesses that are going to try to take advantage of this situation,” Kolberg said. “Some sort of cap on interest rates needs to be done to protect students in a pretty scary market.” On the college’s Student Financial Services website, three private student loan companies are recommended for students — Citizens Bank, Discover and Sallie Mae. All three of these corporations have reached settlements with the U.S. government after using illegal banking practices like fraud and predatory lending. Sallie Mae’s loan servicing operation is carried out by Navient, one of the most profitable private student loan companies in America. In a January 2022 settlement, Navient canceled $1.9 billion in student loans after it was alleged that the corporation intentionally lent subprime loans it knew would fail to American college students. Matthew Ford, the senior corporate communications specialist for Navient, said that the company denies criminal wrongdoing and that it has long advocated to change the student loan system. “We have offered many options for student loan borrowers during the pandemic,” Ford said via email. “Navient recently announced an agreement with a number of state attorneys general to resolve legal matters. We expressly denied violating any law, including consumer-protection laws, or causing borrower harm.” Despite being prey for private student loan companies, most of the college’s students who take out loans do so through the Department of Education’s loan department. While Biden has chipped away and canceled some outstanding student loans that are owed, students like Hugonnet will be buried in both public and private debt after graduation. “It’s really stressful,” Hugonnet said. “I don’t like thinking about it. … I know you can defer them until you’re working, so I think I have one more year before I have to get started [paying]. But it’s daunting because you get out of school and you get a very basic, entry-level job, which doesn’t pay that much as is.”
C o m m e n t a r y : Fa c i n g t h e n i g h t m a r e before ever y course registration BY MYA STENGEL
ing with three overworked professors teaching way more classes than they should be. The college made the choice to downsize the college’s faculty, but how are we supposed to graduate from the college if taking our required classes is no longer guaranteed? I decided to graduate early because I managed to come into my freshman year with extra credits. The possibility was real as long as I stuck to my three-and-a-half-year plan. However, I have begun to realize that no matter how hard I work, how well I do in my classes or how far ahead I plan, it seems that the college keeps working against me. The budget cuts, professor shortage and lack of care about education at this school will be my biggest pitfall here. If I can’t get into the classes I need, the money-hungry college that Ithaca College is will force me to pay nearly an additional $30,000. I may not have to pay just to see if they will offer the classes they promised me. The college will increase our tuition and take our money, yet it denies us the classes we are supposedly paying for. It convinces us to stay, and we keep thinking it will be better next semester. Since my freshman class has started here, the college has been going down a rabbit hole of trying to save itself from its financial crisis. I am sick of worrying if I will graduate on time at this school where the only thing standing in my way is the administration’s mismanagement. We need more professors, we need more sections. We need a better system.
I don’t know if anyone else feels this way, but registration for the last two semesters has felt a lot like entering the grounds for “The Hunger Games.” You wake up five minutes before 7:30 a.m., prepare your laptop, you get your list of course registration numbers situated just next to Homer Connect and you wait. You wait for the race to start, one section, 15 seats or less and dozens of students gunning for it. If you get into your classes and you win at registration every time, you deserve a medal — for the other kids not getting into the course they need to graduate is not your fault. It’s Ithaca College’s fault. I have seen both sides of the spectrum and lived in an in-between. Some people come in with enough credits from high school to register a class ahead of everyone. Others are in the Honors Program and get to register with the very first group. People like me came in with just enough credits to stagger their registration so that they get to register a group ahead of every other semester. And then there are the students who have to go with everyone else. If you are in the Roy H. Park School of Communications, you are working alongside over 300 other students, trying to get into the same classes. One section can have as few as 20 seats for students, and you pretty much have one chance to get it right. If you don’t get into your classes, especially this early on as a sophomore, then your only option is to focus on your Integrative Core Curriculum and out-of-Park credits. Meaning that for an entire semester, you are doing nothing to hone your skills or prepare for your desired career. You will be a drone mindlessly learning things that genuinely don’t matter to you. It isn’t the fault of the students who manage to get into the class or the professors who don’t have control over how many sections there are. The blame lies on the college’s administration and the decline in faculty. I understand that the college is understaffed, underfunded and in a bit of a pinch right now. My major — writing for film, television and emerging media — only had four f aculty members to begin Sophomore Mya Stengel pictured Nov. 17, 2021. Alyssa Beebe/The Ithacan. with. Currently, we are work-
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