Graduates find debt, lack of opportunity overwhelming

As a high school graduate and with the winds of opportunity seeming to be whirling around my mind as I consider what could await my future, I took the advice of our society in going to college. I had a goal of wanting to pursue my “American Dream” and make a positive impact on my community before I reach a ripe age of retirement. I attended Florida Gulf Coast University where I majored in Health Services Administration. As I went through my undergraduate, I began to think about what I wanted to do once I graduated. I found an interest in health law, so I decided that I would pursue a career as a health law attorney after graduation. I worked part-time at Starbucks, attended college full-time, and managed to study for the LSAT before taking it in June 2014.

I continued on into my senior year of college eager to graduate and enter into the next chapter of my life. I led a research team where we worked with the Parkinson Association of Southwest Florida researching the benefits of exercise for persons with Parkinson’s disease. As I graduated in December 2014, I was offered advice by the CEO of a healthcare company to build some work experience before jumping into law school. I thought this was wise counsel so I went on the job hunt.

Now seven months later, I am married and we are excitingly expecting our first child. After much hunting, I was finally hired by a local hospital, which is great, but I made more hourly at Starbucks than I do with a bachelor’s degree at the hospital. Anxiety has already set in as I think about my looming student loan bills and the paternal desire to care financially for my family.

I begin to look around at my fellow peers and notice a common occurrence. I see many peers whom I graduated with struggling to find a job in their selected field or making less than they were promised they would make out of college with a degree. I see many of my college-educated peers working at Starbucks, struggling to make ends meet. I remember a time when I was out with a friend who didn’t go to college. An older gentleman asked us if we were in school. I proudly said I was while my friend said he wasn’t but was working for a company with hopes of moving up within it. The older gentleman seemed to praise me more than my friend because I did the “right thing” in the eyes of our society by going to college. I now look at this friend who moved up in his company, makes three times more than I do now, and has no debt.

As I reflect on this, I can’t help but wonder where the problem is. I have come to the conclusion that the problem is a broken system. Young adults are promised higher income and more opportunity if they go to college. We feel good about our investment because we can see it worked for the previous generations. But as we graduate with a large sum of debt, we find the heart-breaking realization that what we were told isn't what is true. As I was preparing for law school, I read many articles about how tuition continues to rise but job outlook and starting salaries are on the decrease. Do I regret going to college? Absolutely not, I would love to continue my education if I could afford it. But our system is broken and is in desperate need of change.

Joshua Winn lives in Naples.