It was a campaign event to be sure, but also a little more. James Diossa, one of two Democratic candidates in the race for Rhode Island General Treasurer, met with six young people who are considering college, in college, or recently graduated from college about the tremendous burden of student debt.

The roundtable discussion included Maine Treasurer Henry Beck, who came down to talk to the students and to help his friend James Diossa with his campaign. Together, Beck and Diossa hoped to shine a light on an aspect of being State Treasurer that gets less attention than running multi-billion dollar pension funds or chairing state investment boards: Their role in ensuring affordable higher education for young people entering adulthood.

The roundtable discussion on Wednesday morning took place with the full knowledge that President Joe Biden would be announcing his student debt forgiveness plan later in the day. Though full details of Biden’s program were unknown at the time of the discussion, by the afternoon it was understood that students making under $125,000 annually could qualify for up to $10,000 in student loan forgiveness, and Pell Grant recipients could qualify for $10,000 more.

The discussion was around the concept of college affordability, college indebtedness, and the rising cost of tuition.

Participating in the discussion with Diossa were:

• Lauren Smith, a recent college grad from URI with a Political Science degree.
• Megan Labbe a recent graduate from Providence College with a double bachelors in Political Science and Gender Studies.
• Henry Beck, the State Treasurer of Maine.
• Paul Guevremont who is going into his sophomore year a St. Michael’s college in Vermont and a double major in Business and Political Science.
• Meg St. Hilaire, a recent Master’s Graduate from the University of Rhode Island with a degree in systems engineering. She has student debt.
• Jackie Delcourt, a senior at Tiverton High School.
• Daniela Magana, a senior at Boston University with a Health Science major and a Public Policy Analysis minor.
• Moderating the discussion was Robert Craven, campaign manager for Diossa.

You can watch the video here:

The transcript has been edited for clarity:

James Diossa: Thank you for being here. We want to look at issues. How do we help families plan for college so that they don’t graduate with a lot of debt? And the other issue is that people like me, even running for treasurer, still have student debt. How do we help people who are graduating with so much debt that they can’t afford a home, can’t make any investments in starting a new business? That’s a big concern. Today President Biden will announce a big initiative to tackle some student debt, which is a big first step, but we still have families who are going to be struggling. I want to have a conversation so that you can help inform me and also take Henry’s advice. He’s been in the office for four years.

Robert Craven: Was the cost of college a factor in deciding where you went to school?

Daniela Magana: I think the cost of college is one of the biggest things you look at originally. It’s a big price tag when you are initiating the process of applying. I was very lucky. I had a good college and career team that always told me that the cost of college is going to look crazy, but don’t pay too much attention to it. There’s so many scholarships out there that you can apply for and so many other opportunities to look for. But cost was obviously a big concern. And for me personally, the scholarships enticed me onto what path to go down.

Jackie Delcourt: So I’m starting the process of applying to different colleges. I find myself looking at how much financial aid a college can give me over, for instance, that this college is good for law or for the major I want to go into. It’s so sad that I’m prioritizing financial aid over quality of education because the debt I’m going to get from college is going to stay with me for years and years and years. It shouldn’t be that way.

Lauren Smith: I definitely chose my in-state university, URI, because of the affordability. I considered a school in Boston, but it would have been double the price. That wasn’t an option for me.

Paul Guevremont: I think price is one of the biggest things you look at when going into college. When you’re getting out of high school that amount of money is kind of foreign to you. You don’t know how you’re going to pay that back. One of the biggest things kids look at when going into college is price first and everything else second.

Henry Beck: My big price experience was with law school and I’m hearing what you guys are talking about. It’s important that the state provides some affordable option. Maybe it’s not the exact place you want to go, but whether it’s a community college or the state university, Rhode Island is in the top 10 for FAFSA applications, which is pretty impressive. It means people are thinking about and talking about college at an earlier age. Traditional students, 17, 18 years old, are making big financial decisions, so the sooner you can have the conversation, the better.

Megan Labbe: Going into the application process, I knew that I was going to get a lot of financial aid because I grew up in a household that made so little annually. But given that, I wasn’t anticipating the loans that I would need on top of the financial aid. I got over half off of PC’s tuition, but nobody talked to me in high school or during the application process about what the loans actually meant. That wasn’t something I was thinking about very much.

Lauren Smith: The percentage of financial aid that would be allotted to me and the tuition costs were the top priority. My mom was a single mom so I knew that it was going to be mostly my income that’s going to pay for college. I was fortunate that when I was little my father started a College Bound Fund so I had something, but I knew that covered about maybe a year and a half of school.

James Diossa: Maine is known for their 529 plan. How has that worked during the four years of your leadership?

Henry Beck: I have an advisory role on that plan. Our plan’s called NextGen. We have a great matching program from a charitable foundation. We can see the account and match it. Even the expected contribution from a low income family is an amazing amount. It’s eye-popping. So the state the state can do is promote saving and planning. You don’t want to sound out of touch by saying, “save for college” because you can’t save for all of it. It’s a mix, but you have to have a good college savings program with good oversight and matching. People don’t think about state treasurers when they think about college debt. They think about pensions or taxes, but it’s one of our most important roles. It matters who the treasurer is and who’s providing oversight.

James Diossa: In Rhode Island, not only does the treasurer get to oversee the 529 plan, but they also have a seat on the board of the Rhode Island Student Loan Authority, so there’s a lot of ways the treasurer can inform policy from a board perspective.

Robert Craven: How many of you know whether or not your family started a 529 plan?

Daniela Magana: I’ve grown up in a Latino household and college is not something experienced in my family. I’m first generation. Everything that has come up with college has been a product of me looking things up and a product of mentors that I’ve been lucky to have explain things to to me. My parents do the best that they can with the little that they know about the American education system, but it’s different. It’s a different lifestyle because there is a barrier in not only language, but in experience. My family did not have experience. A lot of going to college has been me trying to figure it out or me trying my best to use the resources I have.

James Diossa: I am also first generation. I had to figure it out on my own. It was an overwhelming experience. With what I know now and your experiences, I could be more intentional about getting young families to enroll in 529 plans. My daughter turned three yesterday, she’s already enrolled. Her mom and I have been very active with that fund. You’re not going to cover the whole expense of college with a 529, but at least seed it so it’s not overwhelming. The hope is that they graduate college. And if they want to open up a business, they can because they’re not burdened by debt, or if they want to buy their first home, they can because they’re not overwhelmed with debt..

Jackie Delcourt: My parents tried to save as much as they can, but obviously it’s not going to be enough. I’ve had a job for a few summers now and I’m trying to save on my own, but I do not have a 529 plan and I’m going to try to pay for college. It may take a few years, but I’m going to try.

Lauren Smith: My parents started saving for my two sisters and I, three girls that they had to try to send to college. I know that my parents didn’t have any funding from their parents when they went to college. That played a big factor in how they saved for our college funds, although we definitely didn’t have the whole thing covered. It’s important that you have some type of financial responsibility with your education. I appreciate my education because I have to pay towards my loans.

Paul Guevremont: I’m a first generation college student as well. My parents didn’t start a 529 plan or anything like that before I went in. So I knew it was important to start looking early and seeing what scholarships I could apply for. It was always expected that I was going to take loans or pay out of pocket so at the end of sophomore year, beginning of junior year, I started looking at what schools I could target scholarships at and figure out the different scholarships I could apply for. Though I wasn’t fortunate enough to have a 529 plan in place, I benefited a lot by applying for different scholarships and starting the process early.

Megan Labbe: My dad was a first generation college graduate and he was big into sending me and my sister to school. But he passed away when I was 15 and my mom was absent during the application process, so I did that on my own. I had never heard of 529 plan until right now.

Lauren Smith: My dad attended college, but never finished. He saw the debt that I would be in when I was born. He always told me that the minimum for an education is a bachelor’s. He made sure to help me with that. I’m very grateful for that.

James Diossa: Not everyone goes to college. One of the things that I would love to do is see if we could use the fund, once a student graduated high school, to be able to attend a trade school. I had a lot of friends who did not go to college, but became electricians and plumbers and are doing extremely well. Seeing that result, I want to push in that direction.

Henry Beck: Everyone has heard of a college savings fund, but if you said to someone, “You should open a 529 tax advantage investment account.” It’s going to seem complicated or risky to people. So in Maine we’re looking at this and we think the best you can do is try to keep it simple. Simple option, safe, low fee. The plan won’t be enough for the entire cost of college, but if people start early and if they feel comfortable using it, it helps.

Robert Craven: This is something that Treasurer Seth Magaziner has done. It’s something James is looking to continue. Statistics from the treasurer’s office show that even having less than $400 in a 529 plan makes you significantly more likely to attend and graduate a four-year institution. It’s important to get people to know about it. Part of what James wants to do at the treasurer’s office is expand access to and expand knowledge about 529 plans, especially in communities that might be first generation.

Did you take a job or feel pressured to take paid internships versus unpaid when you were going through school because of the cost of college?

Lauren Smith: Most definitely. I believe most of my college experience, half of it, I was working part-time and then the rest I was working full-time to make sure I had enough to pay my personal bills, besides the college tuition. I had to juggle between the two…

Megan Labbe: I worked multiple part-time jobs to pay my way through college. All of the internship opportunities available to me were unpaid until I was a fellow last summer with the Department of State.

Paul Guevremont: I just finished my fellowship with the Department of State, so that was the first experience I’ve had with a paid internship. As far as jobs go, I’ve been working part-time job since my freshman year of high school to save for college. That’s something that kids have to keep in mind. You have no choice, as far as paying for college goes, other than to save up what you can and work part-time when you can.

Lauren Smith: I also worked multiple part-time jobs and I also had to pay for off campus expenses such as rent, groceries, and gas. Those all added up and I chose to take out more loans for school and use my part-time jobs to pay for all of those living expenses.

Jackie Delcourt: I would love to have an internship, but I don’t because with my age group it’s expected that I’d be unpaid. So I work a part-time job and I’m balancing school with that. I can’t afford to, not necessarily waste my time, but give up my time to an unpaid internship because I need the money to save for college.

Daniela Magana: We’ve all had pretty similar experiences of either working a ton of hours in the summer when you have free time or splitting your time between classes and a part-time job. The idea of not being able to work during a semester definitely causes financial stress. Next semester, my ability to work is not going to be there because I will be abroad and you can’t work while you’re abroad on a visa. It’s been in the back of my mind all summer trying to save up as much as I can, but also, we’re all young people and there’s things we want to do. But we have to weigh our pros and cons and try and set ourselves up as much as possible before the start of the semester.

Robert Craven: What’s the conversation among your peers about college affordability and college debt? What are they thinking about? What are their complaints? Is it something that’s often talked about?

Lauren Smith: When I would speak to classmates we have similar stories about finances – about working and having to do this juggling and how stressful it is. Not only do you have the coming into adulthood stresses but you’re taking on car expenses, utility expenses and rent expenses and all that kind of stuff. And on top of it, you’re having to account for your tuition and make sure you get good grades and account for the textbooks. From the classmates that I’ve talked with, we’ve all been stressed and working under high stress environments because of it.

Megan Labbe: I have many friends who are hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt. And it’s obviously taking a very serious toll on their mental health and their outlook on their future in general. They don’t know what they’re going to do and it’s a terrible situation.

Paul Guevremont: As far as the people that I’ve talked to go I don’t think it’s something that we’ve discussed. I know a a lot of my peers are taking out loans and saying they’ll worry about it later. I can’t imagine that’s a great situation to be in. I feel it should be discussed more and the path that people are taking should be more more open to discussion.

Lauren Smith: My friends have a lot of back different backgrounds. Some of them have full funding to college. Some of them have to pay everything out of pocket. So the discussion changes. With my friends that are less fortunate and have to pay a lot more of their debts, we talk about it more than my friends that are a little bit more privileged and have that type of funding.

Jackie Delcourt: My friends and I are very ready to go to college and we’ve been trying to work towards it for a while now. For the past few summers we’ve all had a job. We don’t see each other much. We’ve been trying to look out for each other, like, “Hey, I found this website as of free textbooks. Maybe we can use that instead of paying a hundred dollars for one book.” We’re trying to help each other out, but again, we don’t know if there’ll be enough in the end. We’ll see.

Daniela Magana: I have friends that from all different backgrounds and friends that live in different kinds of living situations. My friends that are a little more privileged feel uncomfortable speaking about it in the sense that they don’t want to come off as showing off. “I don’t have loans and you do.” It’s easier to have a conversation with someone that has a similar background to you because you can emphasize with each other more than with someone that you don’t share many experiences with. But I do think it’s a very important conversation to have. And with the little that I’ve learned over the years, it’s something that little cousins who are trying to go to college come to me and ask, “What does an unsubsidized loan versus a subsidized loan mean?” It’s little things that that you learn during the process that make it much easier later on.

James Diossa: You’re a young treasurer. How has this experience shaped your decision making on how you talk to young folks in Maine?

Henry Beck: It’s just amazing the kind of pressure we put on young people to make a these decisions. And there are non-traditional students going onto higher ed. To say to someone who’s 17 or 18, “Plan your career plan your debt payments, plan where you need to go.” It’s quite daunting. I think it’s possible to have those conversations and be a broken record in the schools early on. Can I ask, did anyone do a transfer from one college to another?

Lauren Smith: I started off at your URI, went to CCRI, went back to URI.

Henry Beck: That’s quite common, right? In Maine, we’ve passed a law that says, if you’ve left a college, for whatever reason, and still owe them money, you’re still entitled to get your transcript and your information. The worst thing that can happen is that you go to school and have debt, but don’t finish. That’s the worst situation. So we want to make sure, as a matter of law, that there are tools for people to transfer and to come back. Things happen, right? People take a year off and maybe you owe some money to a school, but you’re still entitled to your records.

Robert Craven: One thing that’s been part of the national discussion lately is about college loan forgiveness. What are your thoughts around debt forgiveness?

Lauren Smith: Student loan forgiveness is a good idea. There should be limitations and we need to make sure that the solution is equitable. $125,000 annually is good to start with, but I’d to see more of the statistics…

Paul Guevremont: There is definitely more research to be done because it’s such a new idea. Everybody recently is starting to go to college. A couple generations ago college was a foreign ideology. Now it’s a lot more mainstream. As far as debt forgiveness goes, I was talking to my mom about it this morning. $10,000 is such an interesting amount to to start with because I don’t know if it’s enough, but at the same time, it’s a lot of taxpayer money. My mom was like, “I didn’t go to college.” And my dad didn’t go to college. He’s like, “I kind of feel I’m being cheated out of it because I didn’t go.” Now they’re funding these kids to go. But everybody should have an opportunity to go. It’s such an interesting concept and more research needs to be done about it before any actions are taken.

Megan Labbe: I think it’s a good start. It’s kind of a simple surface level solution that isn’t going to make too big of an impact for most people. I don’t think it’s nearly enough to tackle the student debt in our country, but I don’t have the answers to these problems. I feel it is a pretty big burden on the taxpayer and I don’t think it’s enough to tackle the complicated layers of this problem overall.

Lauren Smith: I think that $10,000 is understandable when broaching a new idea, a new way of thinking, but overall, when I started at URI, in-state tuition with no dorming was about 13 grand. So you’re forgiving a little under a year. And while it helps, you still have three more years if you’re going to a four year school. And you still have all this extra debt. Whenever I would do school, I would always have to judge a minimum of a hundred dollars per class for textbooks.

Daniela Magana: It’s a good start because it shows the community that it is a thought that’s going through political minds and it is an issue. It’s nice and refreshing to see that it is an issue that’s being at least talked about. I do think that $10,000 sounds great, but then when you sit down and you look at how much college actually is – I know I pay out of state tuition because I go to school in Boston – $10,000 wouldn’t do much for me at all. But again, it is a good start. Iit’s not an initiative that should stay where it is. There should definitely be changes as time goes on.

Jackie Delcourt: I agree that it’s a great first step, and it shouldn’t be the final step. More should be added. It should keep growing maybe more money, more than $10,000, because obviously if people have gotten their Masters or their Doctorate, that can be very expensive sometimes. So $10,000 is very small. When you look at the big picture and how much money some people are spending on their college tuition.

Robert Craven: Treasurer Beck, what’s been the plan to address these things? Where’s your office going?

Henry Beck: On the debt side, for a long time we had what’s called the Opportunity Maine Tax Credit, which was great [but] it was pretty complicated and had all these conditions. What the Governor of Maine and the legislature did last session is they passed a simplified, more expansive tax credit. So your loan payment at an accredited institution, you get a $2,500 tax credit, $25,000 in your lifetime. It’s not forgiveness, it’s a tax credit on your return. You get the money back basically. So if someone is able to plan, it’s $25,000 over 10 years. It certainly helps. It’s a reason to be in the state, to file your taxes in the state, that sort of thing. It’s showing that we want people with college educations to live and work here and pay taxes. We’ve been a leader on the tax credit side. It’s something that other states should explore.

Robert Craven: Is it something that your office has found it difficult getting people knowledge about?

Henry Beck: Yeah. People didn’t know about the original program. You’d file your taxes and you had to ask about it and they forget to remind you. So our hope is, like the 529s, to be a broken record and keep it simple and accessible and good will come from it.

James Diossa: So in closing, you have a young and inspiring elected official here. What should take away from all of your experiences?

Paul Guevremont: The biggest thing is education. A lot of kids today take out loans and say, “I’ll worry about it later.” That’s not the best mentality to have – the “I’ll figure it out” mentality. It doesn’t always work out. So the biggest thing is education, educating these kids on how they’re going to pay for college and if they take out a loan, what the serious financial responsibility of that is, how that will look over the next 20, 30 years and paying that back. Starting that way would open up the younger student’s eyes. “Is this something I want to invest in? Because at the end of the day, college is an investment in yourself. If we educate more people that would help with the whole issue.

Robert Craven: From your perspective, where does that education come from? Is that from your guidance counselor, from your parents, maybe from somebody visiting school?

Paul Guevremont: From an education standpoint, the school should definitely be involved. A big problem with the education system is that financial literacy is not something that’s ever taught in any level of schooling. If financial literacy was taught in say, high school, our counselors and our teachers would prepare us, saying, “College is coming up, is that an investment you want to make make?” And show us what that would that look paying that investment back. If we could get a class or two in high school, that would teach us financial literacy and how we could schedule a program to pay back these loans. That would be a good first step in education.

Lauren Smith: I completely agree that financial literacy should be taught in high school. Also, the idea of knowing exactly what you want to do right before you get into college or figuring it out when you’re in college. I didn’t know about so many different career options. So introducing that at a younger age so that we can get students involved in saying that not only college degrees are needed, you can also go for trade schools, and showing the difference between what those look like in terms of finances and that goes into that.

James Diossa: On financial literacy, Treasurer Magaziner passed legislation to promote more financial literacy in our schools. It’s not going to impact you at all, but the younger, starting next semester [will benefit.]

Jackie Delcourt: I would love to have more classes that guide me through this whole process because as of right now, the only way I learn about what I need to do is get ten minutes with my guidance councillor. And that’s about all I get. I don’t have much time. I’d love an hour a day or a week to sit down and say, “Hey, you can go into trade school. You can go here or you can do whatever you want. Not go to college, start your own business.” I feel I wasn’t given a choice. It was like, “Hey, you need to go to college.” And I figured out and I was like, “Okay.”

Daniela Magana: I mentioned before that I was lucky in the college and career team that I had. And also lucky that I went to a small school. I know it’s different when you go to a large public school. I can attest to the difference that it makes when you have a group of people that are willing to sit with you or stay after school with you and go through every single financial aid package that you have. it makes a huge difference. But back to the question that you originally asked, which was what kind of recommendations we have for you guys? One of the things that is important to keep in mind is the huge diversity that we see in backgrounds, but also knowledge. When it comes to programs like these, you said, keep it simple, but then also find a way to communicate that with different communities. Communicating a program like this to an American household is very different than communicating it to a Latino family. Some families don’t have any experience at all and have a lot of fear about taxes and a lot of fear about doing something that the government, can,, for whatever reason, reprimand them for.

So keeping in mind that there’s a wide variety of people in both states. I personally don’t know very much about the population in Maine, but I know that there’s a large diversity in Rhode Island. So keep it in mind that there’s a lot of differences that need to be kept in mind when making these decisions.

Lauren Smith: When I was in high school I was in my junior year trying to pick my classes and I wanted to pick a financially literacy class, but because I’d already progressed past it, I was told I couldn’t go back and learn about personal finances and that kind of stuff. Also, keep hearing from students, keep the open forum regularly talking. That will give you an interior visual to what is going on and the approaches that we’re facing.

Megan Labbe: I agree with what everybody has been saying about financial literacy and engaging students from an earlier age and thinking about their options. But I also agree that what you’re doing here today is important and should continue in the future. It’s one thing to sit here and have a conversation with us, but to then walk away and not forget about what everyone’s saying, because I know if you were to be elected, there would be so many things that you would be juggling and thinking about. Rhode Island’s youth is one of the best, most important and worthwhile things that you can invest in because we know that young minds are our future.

Henry Beck: Just know that it’s challenging and difficult, but you should be proud of your education. No one can take it away from you. And we need good people like James Diossa to figure it out.

James Diossa: Thank you everyone for your time. It was very helpful and informative, but more than that, inspiring to see all of you take the very bold step of getting higher education. I know Rhode Island will be better because of it and I believe that this session, if I’m elected, II will do anything I can to help the younger generations make college or a trade school more accessible for our future.

After the discussion Diossa released a statement:

“We need to continue to hear from students and former students grappling with student debt. That’s why I asked Treasurer Beck to join me to hear from young Rhode Islanders dealing with this issue firsthand. For me, college affordability is a very personal issue. I just turned 37, and I’m still paying off my student loans. So for Rhode Islanders dealing with education-related debt, I can sympathize with you. I know how it feels. Higher education is meant to expand opportunities, not limit them. And right now, debt is the anchor of opportunity keeping many Rhode Islanders in port.

“As your next General Treasurer, I will do all I can to curb the impact of college debt on past students while working to make it more affordable for the next generation of Rhode Islanders. I already started a 529 CollegeBound Saver Plan for my young daughter, Arianna, who turned three yesterday. When Arianna – and young Rhode Islanders like her across our state – consider where to pursue higher education, I don’t want cost to be a factor. I don’t want this new generation to have student debt and all that comes with it. I’m very grateful for those who met with me and voiced their experience. Thank you Jackie, Megan, Daniela, Lauren, Paul, and Meg.“

Despite being an interesting conversation with young adults grappling with the issue and reality of student debt, it was also a campaign event. Diossa came away with two campaign takeaways:

• Diossa plans to work cooperatively with the General Assembly to implement a debt forgiveness program for Rhode Islanders pursuing a career in education or nursing, as well as those who are applying to be first responders. Under the proposed program, the state would forgive college debt for students who intend to pursue one of these career paths in Rhode Island, and commit to staying in Rhode Island for at least four years after graduation.
• As administrator of the state’s 529 CollegeBound Saver Plan, Diossa plans to help educate families about the tangible benefits of starting a college savings fund early. Studies have shown that the likelihood of a child attending and graduating from college incrementally increases if they have a college savings – even if it is only a few hundred dollars.