Student Debt and the Class of 2018

New data show that the average student debt for college graduates continues to climb but at a slower pace. Nationally, about two in three (65 percent) college seniors who graduated from public and private nonprofit colleges in 2018 had student loan debt. These borrowers owed an average of $29,200, 2 percent higher than the 2017 average.

TICAS’ 14th annual report on debt at graduation finds wide variations in debt levels across states as well as colleges. Average student debt at graduation in 2018 ranged from $19,750 in Utah to $38,650 in Connecticut, and new graduates’ likelihood of having debt ranged from 36 percent in Utah to 76 percent in New Hampshire. High-debt states remain concentrated in the Northeast and low-debt states are mainly in the West.