Sometimes we learn, sometimes we don't.

Laura Sandifer is a single mother with one child. She finished her degree at the University of North Texas with $50,000 in outstanding student loans. She says she can't make the $90 a month payments on what she makes -- a total of $34,000 a year. But, she says, the loans "had to be done" or she wouldn't have been able to get that degree in photojournalism. But did she really need that degree? She works at Sally Beauty Supply in information technology, a job I feel sure she would have without expertise in photojournalism.

Anyway, she's exploring civic service programs to find one that will wipe out her student debt. Then, she says, she'd like to go to law school. "We'll see what kind of financial aid I might be able to get," she says. Sometimes people learn, sometimes they don't. And sometimes the system is a terrible enabler.

"UNT student graduated to 30 years of payments." The Dallas Morning News; July 18, 2010; p. 21A.