Lots people finish school with $100,000 in student loans….

 

…They’re called Lawyers.

Sadly they’re also called musicians.  If I had a nickel for every singer or instrumentalist who’s whined to me about paying back their student loans, I could…well…pay back MY student loans. 

We musicians don’t have a monopoly on student debt issues — lots of young people are starting life strapped by debt — but we tend to be hurt by it more deeply than others because our revenue stream follow school is often far below that of other professions.

Why are we artists so susceptible to the student loan trap?  Many reason, obviously, but 3 that stick out in my mind are:

  1. We’re so excited to be accept into a good school that we don’t even consider the financial side of things.  Sure, admission to Julliard is wonderful, but when you combine the cost of tuition with the cost of living in NYC, you’re looking at some serious money unless your family is bankrolling the whole thing.  There are situations where going to such a school would be a sound financial and career decision, but it’s one that must be considered in that light and not just because the school is so prestigious.  Remember, paying back 100k in student debt, even consolidated and stretched out over 30 years is going to be about $300 a month for the rest of your working life! 
  2. We are so caught up in the battle that we forget to fight the war.  We’re besieged with people telling us, “Go to the best school with the best teacher; you’ll find a way to pay the money back later.”  Sounds like perfectly good advice, but if the great school and teacher also wind up causing severe financial distress, you’re going to find yourself in a major bind just about the time your career is taking off.  People push through it, sure, but it’s tough.  I’ve personally known people who had to turn down major career-launching opportunities because they couldn’t afford it. 
  3. The people advising us about school and student loans early on usually have no clue about what we do and how we earn a living.  Many of us are advised to go straight from undergraduate study to grad school and often wind up paying more than if we’d taken a couple years off and developed our product to a point that schools would pay us for our attendance.  Guidance counselors in high school will look at U.S. News and World Report rankings of schools and advise student to apply to the top music schools out there, but so often those schools provide little to their undergrads and use loans for the bulk the financial aid packages. 

So, if so many young people, especially musicians, are straddled with excessive loan debt to the point that it’s compromising their careers, maybe we should….do the opposite?  We need to look at college and graduate study in the context of our business plan and evaluate our options accordingly.  Figuring out exactly what we SHOULD pay for school and how much debt is acceptable is far more art than science and will differ with each situation and set of goals.  Future articles will deal with this more in depth and attempt to divine some guidelines to use when comparing costs and benefits of different opportunities. 

Until then, if you’re a student contemplating going into major debt for music school, chew on this:  If you’re not on a MAJOR scholarship, it’s likely that you’re just “tuition fodder” for the students who ARE on big scholarships.  The people with the scholarships get all the opportunities and the best teachers, while the rest just foot the bill.  I say this not to be harsh, but to make a point.  Schooling is just one small step on a long road, a tool, and it must be used as such.  We should never do it just to do it, and we must not base our final decisions on emotion.  If that means taking some time off to get ourselves to a higher level where we’re competitive for scholarships, then so be it.  Finishing grad school at 24 with 80k in debt versus finishing at 26 with 10k in debt is a HUGE difference. 

Final thought: I’ve been doing this for awhile now, and nobody has ever asked me where I went to school.  Don’t believe the hype!