States with highest & lowest student debt
The college loan burden that students are shouldering when they graduate has gotten heavier, according to a new report released by The Project on Student Debt.
Two-thirds of students in the Class of 2010 graduated withcollege debtwith the average amount being $25,250. Compared with the previous year's average student debt, that's an increase of five percent.
Obviously, this is a particularly bad time to be graduating with student loans when the unemployment rate for recent college grads is 9.1%.
The student loan debt varied significantly by state. Students living in the Northeast and Midwest faced greater debt than the rest of the country. Students from New Hampshire graduated with the highest level of debt ($31,048) while Utah residents graduated with the lowest ($15,509).
States with highest student debt
Schools with the lowest student debt
Private colleges where it's easy to get into financial trouble
When researchers looked at the average debt that students were graduating with at individual institutions, there was a huge range. At the campus level, average debt for individual students ranged from $950 to an astounding $55,250.
Here are the schools that graduate students with the highest amount of student debt:
Bottom line: It's okay to borrow for college as long as you stick with federal student loans. For most students, the maximum they will be able to borrow with federal college loans is $27,000. You can learn more about safely borrowing here: