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Wednesday, May 2, 2012

Affordable College is not a Luxury. It´s the Foundation of a Healthy Middle Class « MomsRising Blog

Affordable College is not a Luxury. It´s the Foundation of a Healthy Middle Class « MomsRising Blog:

Lily Eskelsen

Affordable College is not a Luxury. It´s the Foundation of a Healthy Middle Class

Posted May 2nd, 2012 by Lily Eskelsen
I was lucky that I went to college in 1976. I was working as a secretary but I wanted so much to be a teacher. My husband and I were living paycheck to paycheck and could meet our bills just fine, but we had no extra money to send me to college. My parents were doing just fine, but they were still raising my little brothers and sisters, and they had no extra money to send me to college.
I am a teacher today because the government of the United States of America invested in me. My country gave me money to go to college.
In 1976, I applied for a National Direct Student Loan to pay for my expenses at the University of Utah. There was no expensive middle-man bank. I owed the government the loan. I owed 3% interest. I had ten years to pay it back. And I did.
I graduated and became a teacher. I paid higher taxes than I did when I was a secretary. I did work that was important to my community. My husband and I were able to save a little money for our children’s college. We bought a


Read more: http://www.momsrising.org/blog/affordable-college-is-not-a-luxury-it%c2%b4s-the-foundation-of-a-healthy-middle-class/#ixzz1tj77jJAq