States With The Highest Average Student Debt

In which states are students in the most debt?

According to a new report, it's New Hampshire -- where the average student debt tops $31,000. This is far above the average American college student's debt, which stands at $25,250.

The Project on Student Debt used voluntarily reported data from 1,067 public and private colleges to determine each state's student debt average. According to their findings, Northeastern and Midwestern states have higher debt levels than Western states as more students in the Northeast and Midwest attend private colleges.

Below, see the top 10 states with the highest student debt averages. Then tell us -- are you in debt? What's your story? Share it in the comments section.

See the full report from the Project on Student Debt here (pdf).

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Comments

[voicebodycheck]

06:54 PM on 12/29/2011

Do you wish i could say something about school and debts in the same column?:
"WAIVERS!"
no money to go back to school, no jobs offered a SCHOLARSHIP STUDENT.
WHAT DO YOU DO?
BY THIS WAIVER SYSTEM, I FINISHED THE REVISION ON A BOOK I WROTE 30 YEARS AGO.
YOU HAVE NOT SUNG THE SONGS.... YOU SAY YOU READ MUSIC
i see alot of bright stars.... but by the time they want to screem "alzheimers" at me from some library podium.... i will have produced this book twice and entered it in an INTERNATIONAL AUDIENCE SETTING: THE BOOK:{SONGS FOR SOULS*SERIES
MYBLOG/CLAUDIASONGS

MY NAME is claudia humphrey, missionary
I LEARNED to play the violin and in the orchestra after fifty years old... opposition homeless lifestyle, carry violin, go to school, unemployment office....hard but done!
NOT RECOMMENDED IT IS WHAT YOU DO WHEN THERE IS LESS H E L P! GET A LETTER OR TWO OUT TODAY//// I WILL GO THE LIBRARY WAY!

[Reikoku Jaken]

11:39 AM on 11/18/2011

Who would have thought that easy credit and easy admissions would lead to massive inflation in college costs.

The Deans and such are doing very well though. I was shocked to find out that an *assistant* dean at a community college was hard to find at the pay grade of $80,000 per year.

You know, the person who spends most of their week in useless meetings and does nothing towards actually improving the quality of education at a school which retains him or her.

[Fennis]

09:29 PM on 11/13/2011

Try getting a degree in aviation or some other degree and still paying for flight training. Tuition, living, and the costs of flying. Were talking upwards of $100k at least.

[gr8bsn]

11:38 AM on 11/11/2011

If you are GEN-X or younger, you were told by the baby boomers that you had to go to college no matter what. Only a fool would waste their lives digging ditches and flipping hamburgers. When college got too expensive to pay for even with a job, students took out loans so that they would not be stuck digging ditches and flipping hamburgers. Now that the economy has collapsed, a lot of grads are holding out for a job in their field. Meanwhile, those who told us that we were failures as human beings if we settled for digging ditches and flipping hamburgers are calling us lazy and conceited... because we don't want to dig ditches or flip hamburgers. In other words, we followed their advice to the letter, and now we're judged for it.

[Goldie Treasure]

04:38 PM on 11/05/2011

All of those amounts are "wow", I'm a NY college student and I'm hoping when I transfer to a 4 year school, I won't have as much debt. I never bothered looking for scholarships but I sure will start now.

[incorrigible]

09:54 PM on 11/27/2011

also make sure you're working towards a marketable degree. Serially. Im not joking.

[FrkrBYtheSpkr]

02:41 PM on 11/04/2011

Try going to art college on your own dime... Even with grants and scholarships, I lowered my tuition over the years from a would-be $160,000 down to $78,000. That's right, $78,000 I owed as of graduation in 2009. Try that on for size, OWS... I worked for EVERYTHING, and I'm still doing so. And I still want to be in that 1%, hence all the effort.

[rysagr]

02:53 PM on 11/04/2011

fanned for that

[thaggas]

02:55 PM on 11/04/2011

Yah, but that 1% doesn't want you and they get to control who gets in.
THAT is what OWS is about.

[corwin]

11:50 AM on 11/05/2011

Is that it? I wasn't sure,but the capital letters made a difference.

[epluribusunum76]

02:27 PM on 11/04/2011

What none of the politicians/baby bombers ; ) seem to understand is that because of all of the student debt the housing market is going to become over saturated with houses, driving down the value of their investment. How are we going to get mortgages, or even commit to buying a house, when we already have so much debt. They need to imagine what it would have been like for them to start off their adult lives with two mortgages.

[ridnggirl]

05:51 PM on 11/06/2011

What few of the current college students realize is that most baby boomers who were not born with a silver spoon in their mouth, and managed to go to college, and maybe grad school, had to be aware of what they could do to earn a living when they were finished. I, along with most of my peers, had part time jobs in high school, and certainly in college. At one point I worked full time on a second shift data entry job during two tight financial quarters. No TV or phone in my dorm room. No car until I saved enough money over two summers to get an old used one. No dinners out, no movies unless they were on campus. No frills........... schools were chosen for academics, not for sports and various luxury amenities in most cases. I knew how much debt I could leave with, and how long it would take me to pay it off.

Somehow, college education got derailed in the US. Now, many dorm rooms look like hotel rooms. Tons of money has been spent on fancy buildings, cafeterias, pools, and sports equipment. None of that has prepared todays young people for what lies ahead in a time when our young will compete with kids from China and India who are literally and figuratively hungry, and will do anything for an education..... a REAL education.

Plan ahead.

[epluribusunum76]

09:11 PM on 11/06/2011

Went to community college for two years to save on tuition and so I could live at home, working 30 hours a week. Tuition increased both years from the year before. Transferred to a private school in driving distance with almost a full scholarship, worked 30 hours a week and graduated magma cum laude. Tuition increased both years. Am now going to a top-30 law school with pretty much a full scholarship. I took every step to ensure low debt, turning down top-6 law schools. In the suny system black mold can be growing above your bed, so where you get hotel room quality is baffling to me. Who’s responsible for commercializing higher education in the U.S.--the baby boomers. Who’s responsible for the rapidly growing disparity of wealth on wall st. compared to main street-- the baby boomers. Who created financial WMD's like CDO's and CDW's. Who repealed the financial safeguards put in place by the greatest generation, under whose watch did deregulation take place? You might not have been born with silver spoons in your mouths, but your generation ensured that there would be no silver for the next generations. The baby boomers made some of the greatest achievements, from computers to the internet, but unfortunately the progress made by so few will be overshadowed by the horrors of the many. But, more importantly, it’s not a matter of blame. The ball was dropped, and it’s time for someone else to take over.

[Norm]

12:23 PM on 11/08/2011

College has changed a lot. I worked, as did my son, but when he went to school no one took the 18 credits I took as a matter of course, and the education was extended to six years, because they didn't have open required courses much of the time. Over a certain number of courses, the schools now charge separately, which leaves students both not as educated and more likely to be unable to pay; to me, someone taking four courses is a slacker. Certainly there are more silly luxuries that don't contribute meaningfully to an education; I also never watched television and couldn't afford clothes, much less a meal out. Kids suffer now, but they suffer in style.

[cj4122012]

08:58 AM on 11/07/2011

Its completely true, not only that but the cost of tuition and living has skyrocketed with inflation and the comparison of the costs of living (tuition, rent, food, books, etc) have gone up, but our earning potential with minimum wage and entry level jobs can't match it. My mom put herself through college, but that was also when her school in Michigan charged $19 a credit hour. She was also making about $15/h working as a bank teller. The pay for these types of jobs has gone up over the years, but nowhere near the rate that tuition has (over $500 a credit hour). Its hard for them to see the disparity because they can sit back and say "well i did it, so can you". but there is NO way in hell i'd even be able to partially pay my rent for even a quarter making $8/h, 50+ hours a week for an entire summer. It truly is unfair and they just can't see it this way.

[ArtsyJane]

02:19 PM on 11/04/2011

Well, of course, those are states where people tend to go to college.... not like some others...

[disporting]

02:29 PM on 11/04/2011

True dat.

[OhManOhMan]

11:30 AM on 11/04/2011

GOP - build more private prisons

DEM - let's see here.. we're still thinking

Result: tax payers spike and we're seeing more prisons built than education.

[TiltedHorizons]

11:23 AM on 11/04/2011

Additionally, parents are often much deeper in debt on education loans than their child/student because students usually can't borrow enough. All that student and, particularly, parent debt is money that could be spent to help stimulate the economy.

[corwin]

11:59 AM on 11/05/2011

I just don't follow this. I'm not an econ major,but i have read Von Neumann's and Morgenstern's classic text. FYI JvN was considered the brightest intellect of the last century.)
COuld you expand a bit

[TiltedHorizons]

03:12 PM on 11/07/2011

I know almost nothing about economics; I don't even follow your reply. :^) What I know is my daughter took the max loans available to her and will soon graduate with about $25K in debt. My wife and I had to borrow ~$100K on top of that so our daughter could attend college. Our daughter will likely incur another ~$100K to obtain her post-graduate degree, during which time my wife and I will be supporting her because her graduate work is year-round and doesn't allow for meaningful employment . And our son is next to college in a year or two. That's a lot of dough that will go to replay ridiculously-priced education expenses instead of buying cars, improving the home, taking vacations, etc.