Experts: Debt Forgiveness Will Help Black Women Facing Student Debt

Belma Moriera faces $24,000 in student debt.Belma Moriera chose to attend college with the understanding that a degree would get her where she wanted to be in life. A single mother of four children, she  saw herself becoming a massage therapist and aesthetician, careers institutions promised would give her the freedom of a good income, stability, and time with her children.

“My belief has always been, work hard, and teach my kids what you can get if you work hard and are responsible,” said Moriera. “But this system is not built for me, or my children, as a Black woman.”

Instead of living the American dream after graduation, Moriera is now one of the millions struggling with student loan debt. By the time of her graduation, Moriera had attended three for-profit institutions, including ITT Technical Institute. While the Biden-Harris administration announced $1.1 billion in debt relief to 115,000 borrowers who attended ITT Tech, Moriera still owes $24,000 in debt, just a fraction of the nationwide student debt total of $1.6 trillion.

Moriera shared her story on Wednesday at a webinar hosted by The Education Trust, a national nonprofit that works to close opportunity gaps that disproportionately affect students of color and students from low-income families. Ed Trust was joined by the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) and Black Girls Vote and Higher Heights for America PAC, two groups working for the political interests of Black women.

Victoria Jackson, assistant director of higher education policy at Ed Trust and lead researcher on Ed Trust’s Black student debt reports.Panelists addressed the disproportionate financial and mental burden of student debt on Black women, and how that burden is harming their mental and physical health, their families and communities. Experts called for a total cancellation of student loan debt through building coalitions and advocated for a financial overhaul of the American system of higher education.

Because state funding for higher education has seen a dramatic decrease in the last two decades, and inflation has decreased the purchasing power of the Pell Grant, Ed Trust has found that Black women owe an average of $38,000 in student loans after earning a bachelor’s degree and over $52,000 for earning a graduate degree.

“Black women borrow the most,” said Victoria Jackson, assistant director of higher education policy at Ed Trust and lead researcher on Ed Trust’s Black student debt reports. “They shoulder the greatest burden from the high cost of college.”