The wallets of young college students and their parents are not the only thing feeling the burn of college finances these days.

College students are more than ever depressed and stressed out about finances as they enter higher education institutions, according to a report published in the Chronicle of Higher Education by the Higher Education Institution at the University of California at Los Angeles of first-year undergraduate students.

“The percentage of students reporting good or above-average emotional health dropped from 55.3 percent in 2009 to 51.9 percent in 2010,” according to “The American Freshman: National Norms for Fall 2010 survey conducted by UCLA.

They reported that these findings “marked the lowest point since 1985 when the survey first asked the question.”


Hilary Hopkins, Communications and Science Disorders major at the University of Oklahoma, has witnessed  the affects college finances can have on the emotional health of an individual.

“I had a friend last semester whose emotional health took a downward spiral,"Hopkins said."Her parents had lost their jobs and declared foreclosure on their house. She took on a job, but was faced with having to pay her own expenses of going to school like her tuition, rent, food costs, and other expenses all by herself. At one point in time I was visiting her at her house and she was eating rice just to make it through the week until she could afford to go to the grocery store.”

“She was always working, studying, or trying to deal with the financial aid she was in desperate need of," which Hopkins said was the start of the downward spiral of her friends physical health because "She was barely eating causing her appearance to change.”

It wasn’t until Hopkins’s friend “began shutting herself out from everyone,” she said that she realized how much college expenses could really take a toll not just physically, but mentally on an individual.

“She used to be a very social person," Hopkins said. "She was involved in a lot of campus activities and always hanging out with friends and going to social events.”

However, this all stopped when the financial troubles of college expenses hit her and her family, which led to her avoiding social interaction with her peers Hopkins explained.




Hopkins claimed that her friend’s money issues lead to a series of events that caused her to go into depression.

“Because of her friends money issues back home the financial burden of college expenses was passed on to her,” Hopkins said. Therefore, “she had to get a job, which took away from her studies and social interaction with her friends.”

The lack of social interaction either because she didn’t have the time or because she avoided it all together in fear of it causing any expense on her part forced her to cut out communication and any interaction she needed to stay a happy and healthy individual, Hopkins said.

“She was a whole new person,” Hopkins said. “Her attitude and appearance had changed. She was depressed. She did eventually receive help from the university financially, but never sought out the get the help she needed for her depression.”

College, people say, is supposed to be some of the best experiences of your life. With the UCLA survey finding students reporting the lowest levels of emotional health since the survey began, some may wonder how this statement can be true. This finding should be taken into consideration as thousands of students enroll in higher education institutions. Universities everywhere need to ensure students stay healthy emotionally so they can be productive in and out of the classroom and create those memories that make college the best, not the most depressing and stressing times of their lives.