Time to change education mindset from debt

Can you imagine going through college or university through dint of hard work alone? Of course you must read to pass your exams, but that is not the kind of hard work I mean.

I am talking about paying no tuition at all legally and graduating with no debt at all. Scholarships are okay but they rarely cover much outside tuition and lodging.

In America, a few no-frills colleges and universities have gone one step beyond the work-study program by offering free tuition in exchange for working for the school.

If my American cousin had been aware of such a business model in education, he would not be weighed down right now by a $40 Grand plus guaranteed student loan scheme from 1979/1980.

I certainly wish I had had that option when I was in school. Not that my parents would have approved, even supposing the option were open to indigent foreign students too.

But then again, education is a privilege to be paid/sweated for and not a right to be enjoyed/obtained free of charge, right?

I wish students in my country would get that kind of gumption. There was a time that Nigerian universities provided cheap and wholesome meals with low tuition.

Then some students complained about the "bad" subsidized food and preferred more exclusive fare closer to their idea of home cooking, even at a higher cost.

So the federal government closed the campus kitchens and canceled the meal ticket system so that the students could pursue their culinary dreams at will.

When the cost of food began to bite with increasing tuition, the same set of students began to complain about problems operating their personal budgets in school.

That's life; you just must chew whatever you have bitten off on your plate of food....