Congresswoman Ann M. Kuster, D-N.H., visits Keene State College Thursday and sits on a panel discussing ways for students to deal with the cost of higher education. To her left is Tara Payne of N.H. Higher Education Assistance Foundation Network.
Congresswoman Ann M. Kuster, D-N.H., visits Keene State College Thursday and sits on a panel discussing ways for students to deal with the cost of higher education. To her left is Tara Payne of N.H. Higher Education Assistance Foundation Network.
Michael Moore / Sentinel Staff
Keene State College Student Body President Robert Graham, a junior, poses a question to Congresswoman Ann M. Kuster at the college on Thursday.
With the cost of higher education continuing to soar and loan debt mounting for students across the country, U.S. Rep. Ann M. Kuster, D-N.H., told Keene State College students Thursday that college affordability is one of her priorities.
Kuster led a town hall discussion at the college’s Young Student Center, along with other Keene State and higher education officials.
The panel included Kemal Atkins, the vice president for student affairs and enrollment management at the college; Scott Power, director of N.H. Scholars, a federally funded state program that encourages 8th graders to take more rigorous courses in high school; Tara Payne, the vice president of college planning and community engagement for the N.H. Higher Education Assistance Foundation; and Patricia Blodgett, the director of financial aid at Keene State.
“One of the biggest concerns I have is New Hampshire has the highest amount of per student debt than any state in the country,” Kuster said.
The average debt a student leaves college with in the state is about $33,000, she said.
On average, students graduate college with $28,400 debt, according to The Project on Student Debt from the nonprofit Institute for College Access & Success.
However, Granite State students have one of the lowest loan default rates in the country, Blodgett said.
Still, Kuster said she’s concerned that graduating students may have enough debt that they’ll have to choose a more lucrative career to pay off their loans instead of pursuing a job of greater social importance, such as becoming a teacher.
Political science professor Michael Welsh asked Kuster if her colleagues in Congress, who went to college decades ago, can understand the struggles students experience today.
Kuster said some policymakers understand, but “there are many who do not, and I am sometimes appalled when I hear public officials that make comments that are so out of touch with what people’s lives are really like.”
She cited then-presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s suggestion in 2012 to Otterbein University students in Ohio that young people should borrow money from their parents to start their own businesses.
Mackay added that in the past 30 years, federal aid has shifted from grants to loans and that individual states have made decisions to pass costs onto students.
Payne said she looked at the Higher Education Act that President Lyndon B. Johnson signed in 1965 and at the time he described education as a public good. Now the message is if a student wants to go to college, it’s his or her responsibility to fund it.
“The burden is now on the individual,” she said. “I hope that turns around again.”
Matt Nanci can be reached at 352-1234, extension 1439, or mnanci@keenesentinel.com. Follow him on Twitter @MNanciKS.
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