How would you solve the student debt crisis?

[KingSweden]

1) Allow existing debtholders facing bankruptcy to actually discharge loans in bankruptcy. Do NOT do a blanket forgiveness - like others have pointed out, this is unfair to those who did not accrue debt and paid as they went, or had massive loans they paid off

2) Slash interest rates.

3) At PUBLIC universities, shift tuition to a back-pay system. You don't take a loan, but you have to pay the university back for the first 20 years after graduation. 1 year at school = 5 years needed to pay. You can determine percentages of income, but the dollar amount is unfixed - you pay X% of income regardless of income. So if your college does zip to educate you and get you good work after college, they don't make much back. Have the colleges have some skin in the game. This will also disincentives the skyrocketing tuition raises and facilities arms race going on.

This obviously does not help those at private universities, but it shouldn't. Public policy should be designed to help those partaking in public institutions. If you choose to go to an Ivy League school, it's not anybody else's problem how you pay for it. Those big endowments should probably be incentivized into doing more than being a hedge fund, though.

[KingSweden]

For students looking at public universities, but are worried about debt, I recommend community college for the first couple of years. Most courses, especially required courses, ohlne would take in the first two years can be found at community colleges. I know a number of students in the last decade who managed costs very well this way.

Do you think that students at community colleges have access to anything resembling the academic or social support available to the most successful students at four-year public schools? It's difficult to find data that shows how comparable students perform at different kinds of institutions because the student populations are so different. I know that many students do very well by starting out at a community college, but I'm skeptical of the idea that it provides a comparable learning environment for students.

Also, for what it's worth, it's difficult for me to put my personal experience aside: The best thing that happened to me when I left for college was that I was surrounded by other highly motivated students. I know plenty of people who have enrolled at community colleges, and all of them complained about how the lack of seriousness from (at least some of) their classmates affected their studies. In the most extreme cases, this extended to students involved in violent crime and gang activity on campus. In other words, some of our community colleges in New York State are beginning to the kinds of problems that we usually associate with the worst urban high schools. If debt were my only alternative to avoiding that, I would take on the debt.

Your skepticism is not unfounded. There is a very broad range in quality among CC's, much more than four-year traditional institutions.

[KingSweden]

Allow student loans to be discharged in bankruptcy. Offer free community college to all students with a 2.5 GPA or higher in high school, with scholarships available to state schools for those who excel in community college.

If people still want to attend an 80K liberal arts college, that's their business. The best way to solve the student debt crisis is to make alternatives easier and more appealing.

Scholarships are a good idea, too. Basically, make public universities and colleges more appealing but private is private - that's your business.