I was a student, without a student loan.
I'm a graduate without debt.
Let me tell you a story:
I used the OSAP platform to apply for bursaries and scholarships in the final few academic weeks of my classroom semesters of college. A few other students had indicated that they had received small amounts of grant or bursary monies, and something possessed me to roll the dice and apply to OSAP, the government entity that deals both with scholarships, grants and bursaries AND loaning out money, for the purposes of securing a bursary that I thought was A) large and B) available to me - it was neither, in fact, I was eligible for absolutely nothing, but let me tell you this:
To apply for grants with OSAP, they get a variety of information from you - social insurance, checking account numbers, the whole nine yards. I think I even had to prove Christina's income.
…I woke up one morning to a direct deposit from the government of some $8,600 and I just shook my head. I had missed something in the process - I hadn't clicked the right button. There was a loan declination button somewhere, but it had missed my attention.
I logged on to the website and pressed the appropriate buttons to have 100% of the money returned to the government the next day.
I got me thinking - it's so ingrained, it's such a part of college and university culture to have or take out student loans that anything different is weird.
I had neglected to click a button, and that's why the automated system deposited money into our account.
Had I been 18, 19, 25 year old David waking up to that money in my account, what would I have done?
Probably a happy dance somehow thinking the money was "mine" and then blowing through it? Then tough slogging over years of repayment, with nothing to show for it?
It's a bit cliché, but it's true - you can wander into debt, you cannot wander out.
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