Student number two is a pretend student. Believe it or not, I have met several educated adults who, when facing large credit card debt and car or mortgage delinquencies, enroll in school just to collect federal student loan funds.

These ill-informed people wish to solve a debt problem by taking on more debt, and they feel this is a good idea mainly because they don’t take student loans seriously. Too often I have heard people flippantly refer to student loans as debt that you don’t really have to pay back, either because they falsely believe that loans can be placed in forbearance indefinitely, or because they do not understand the repercussions of default. Too many adults view credit cards as ‘real’ debt and student loans as ‘play’ debt.

How can we help the pretend student? Ensure that one-on-one entrance counseling stresses the terms of repayment, the monthly amount they will likely be responsible for, and the consequences of default. Talk to the student and try to gauge their current financial situation. If a person is already facing collection calls for other bills, they may not see student loan delinquency as a big deal- make sure they understand that the government will garnish wages and withhold tax returns. While we certainly don’t want to scare students away from our schools, we need them to understand that student loan debt is real, as are the collectors that will come calling down the road if loans are handled irresponsibly.

Next week, the perpetual student.