Student loan changes under Trump are stressing out students and parents. Here’s some expert advice.

The Trump administration has done an overhaul of student loans, which makes it harder to get student loan forgiveness for public service work and doubles the monthly amount that many borrowers have been paying. The changes are unmooring not only students but parents who’ve taken out ParentPlus loans to help put their children through college.

“Our student loan payments are approaching the size of our mortgage payment. Eventually, something has to give,” wrote Chris Topher of Poplar Bluff, Missouri. He and his wife took out student loans to put themselves through school and later ParentPlus loans to get their five children through college. 

“We are not asking to avoid our responsibilities,” continued Topher in a letter this August posted to the website of the nonprofit organization Student Debt Crisis Center. “We borrowed money, and we understand that loans must be repaid. What I am asking is whether repayment should be structured in a way that recognizes the difference between gross income and money actually available to a household. A family’s ability to pay cannot realistically be determined without considering taxes, housing, utilities, transportation required for employment, and other unavoidable costs of living.”

Leah Piccotti of Reno, Nevada, wrote a letter to the same site this July to report that she had greatly benefitted from the Biden administration’s 5% cap on the former SAVE college loan plan, but new changes under the Trump administration mean she is losing 24 months of credit toward the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program and extending her payments for 3 years. 

“But my payments will be jumping from $129 a month to $560!” she posted. “We are all struggling to keep up with inflation for our basic needs and now get slapped in the face with an increase (and no cap!) that no one can afford.”

On Reddit, members at r/studentloans are sharing their fear and despair after working toward student loan forgiveness through a public service loan for years through the SAVE program, only to see it disappear. “You’re not alone,” one user wrote. “I cannot stress that enough. You are not alone in this dumpster fire.” 

To help readers understand the little-publicized changes to student loans, we spoke with college financial expert Jennifer Finetti, director of student advocacy at Scholarship Owl, a service that connects students with a wide variety of scholarships.

“Borrowers today are extremely stressed – there’s a lot of anxiety, a lot of fear,” she said. Finetti explained that it’s crucial to understand how student loans have changed under the second Trump administration, and how students and parents can best protect themselves going forward. Read her interview here.  –Diana Hembree

One woman’s mission to help middle school girls expand their emotional literacy in Metro Chicago

Thanks to Keana Shatteen, middle school girls at Gen. George S. Patton School in Riverdale, Illinois are learning that big feelings don’t have to end in big blowups. 

The monthly mentoring group, which included 27 girls at its first session, teaches participants to understand and relate to their emotions when stressed, as well as how to communicate clearly. The school has offered a similar group oriented at boys for three years, but nothing for girls until Shatteen arrived. For her, the work is also personal, she told the Chicago Tribune.

When Shatteen was 16, her mother died, leaving her with feelings of abandonment that her father’s struggle with alcoholism compounded. Years later, as her marriage ended, the wounds resurfaced. In 2019, she attempted suicide. “I didn’t know how to put words to my suffering,” she said. “We just know we’re in pain and want the pain to go away.”

In the aftermath of her trials, Shatteen found the 12-step program Emotions Anonymous, which eventually led her to professional therapists who helped her work through her trauma. “I learned how to forgive myself for any mistakes I had made, and to forgive my father and make amends for the mistakes he made,” she said. 

Shatteen’s 18-year-old son has also fueled her recovery. “I really want to make sure he has a different world than we grew up in, where he can be honest, open, and embrace his vulnerability,” she said. Now, her work is giving young people the tools and knowledge she didn’t have growing up.

At the Patton School, that means giving girls the language she lacked — which interim principal Paula Brown hopes teaches them to talk through conflict instead of fighting or walking away from friendships. To teach the all-important skill, Shatteen helps the students role play real-life scenarios, like being excluded at the lunch table. The intent, Shatteen said, is to show that communication is “like a muscle; you have to exercise it.” 

Each participating girl also gets a journal and a standing invitation to bring whatever she’s carrying into the room. “Youth want to be seen, they want to be heard,” Shatteen said. “I want to help them identify the emotional language to ask for the support they need.” 

Teen depression has slightly decreased, but the CDC’s latest report is deeply flawed

American teens are feeling slightly better, according to the latest Youth Risk Behavior Survey, published by the Centers for Disease Control. Conducted every two years, the latest report finds that mental health symptoms and suicide risk among teens dropped in 2025 compared with 2023. The numbers are notable – but there’s a caveat, NPR reports. 

The good news is that persistent sadness or hopelessness that afflicted 42% of high schoolers in 2021 fell to 40% in 2023 and 33% in 2025. The share of high schoolers who seriously considered suicide dropped from 22% to 14% over those same four years, and the share who made a suicide plan fell from 18% to 12%.

“After the pandemic, we had our all time high of suicide attempts and ideation and visits to the ER with suicidality,” said Dr. Vera Feuer, chief clinical officer at the Child Mind Institute. Though many teens are still struggling, she called the new numbers encouraging. 

The report also found teens eating more fruits and vegetables and joining more sports teams, though total physical activity saw little improvement. Overall, “this is good news for kids, for us, and for our country,” said Jennifer Shuford, CDC deputy director and chief medical officer.

The report reflects the MAHA (Make America Healthy Again) priorities of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in terms of food consumption and physical activity but it omits important items that have been in previous surveys: findings on smoking, vaping, substance abuse, sexual behavior, students’ attitude toward school and LGBTQ youth, as well as in-depth findings on race and ethnicity.

In other news…

The next time failure arrives, read a book: Everyone fails at something, more than once. Those failures may be predictable and relatively harmless, like ditching a New Year’s resolution by February, or life-altering, like losing a dream job or the unwanted end of a loving relationship. The ones that sting the most are those we take most personally.

“Something I consider a huge failure, you might brush off as a small mistake, and vice versa,” clinical psychologist Ashley Chin told the New York Times. Our definitions, she said, are shaped by the messages we absorbed growing up and by how closely a setback touches our sense of ourselves. Sometimes, the fallout can leave us reeling and unsure of what to do next. Therapy can help, Chin said, but a good book might be an easier place to start. “Reading offers comfort and support at a time when we fear getting wounded further,” added psychologist Amanda Cassil. When you’re struggling, these picks from experts who study failure may help.