Students Who Don’t Finish College Still Face Student Loan Debt

By Parker Tillson and Abbi Ross
The Razorback Reporter

Student debt after graduation is an issue for college students everywhere, but many of those who have dropped out or left school still face a debt burden.

That debt can affect former students in various ways, making it more difficult to purchase a new house or return to school.

Meredith Petrus from Springfield, Missouri was a sophomore at the UofA when she caught strep anginosus, a bacterial infection, and fell into a medically induced coma for two weeks. Unable to make up the time she missed, Petrus was forced to withdraw from the university. 

Petrus estimated her hospital bills were about $1 million. On top of that burden, Petrus said she faced student loan debt of between $6,000 to $7,000 after withdrawing from school after just one year.

“I had to get on a payment plan for my school and my hospital bills,” Petrus said. “So I’m just chipping away at it slowly.” 

“It’s already been a year and I haven’t even made a dent,” Petrus said.

Petrus has returned to the UofA as a 23-year-old junior, and is a manager at Wasabi, a sushi restaurant on Dickson Street.

If Petrus’ debt was averaged out into four years, it would be about $2,000 to $6,000 more than the average graduation debt for UofA students, which was $14,181 in 2017, according to College Scorecard, a U.S. Department of Education database.

Alex Ramirez, 24,  of Rogers, Arkansas, attended the UofA and withdrew after five years because of a lack of interest in his degree. Ramirez left with only $3,000 of debt. Ramirez said he kept the debt low due to his work ethic.

“I always had two jobs,” Ramirez said. “If I wasn’t in school I was at work.” 

Leah Willeford, a 37-year-old from DeValls Bluff, Arkansas, is one of many former students in Arkansas who now faces around  $15,000 student debt after she withdrew from college.

Willeford started school at Arkansas State University in Jonesboro in 2000 with the goal of attending pharmacy school, but then withdrew, she said.

She withdrew from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock in 2005, Willeford said.

“I accumulated debt that I am still paying,” Willeford said. “The first few years were hard financially, I had to take hardship forbearance which allowed the interest to go up.”

Hardship forbearances allow those with debt to temporarily stop making federal loan payments to avoid default, according to the Federal Student Aid website. 

Willeford now faces monthly debt payments, and worries it will affect her ability to buy a house. 

In 2016-2017 the average median debt for students who withdrew from Arkansas colleges was $12,250, a figure that rose $1,993 from the 2015-2016 school year. 

Anna Ramirez started school at Arkansas State University Mountain Home in 2004, before transferring to the UofA, for a degree in photojournalism. She withdrew in the spring of 2011 because she did not have financial aid for another semester, she said.

Anna Ramirez said she has accumulated around $40,000 in student debt.“If I had known then what I know now, I would have not gone into debt for the education I got,” Anna Ramirez said, who is not related to Alex Ramirez. “Even if I had graduated that semester, the amount of debt I am in, I cannot make enough money in Arkansas to pay that debt.”

Arkansas State University Mountain Home’s total median debt for students who withdrew was $4,750 in the 2016-17 school year. This withdrawal debt level decreased by $3,250 from the year before, the biggest decrease in debt for the state.