$200K for a sociology degree?

Kelli Space is 23 and living at home with mom and dad, trying to pay off the $200,000 in student loan debt she racked up getting a Sociology degree from Northeastern University. If you are keeping score at home, her payments are $900 a month until 2011, when they increase to $1600 a month for the next 20 years.

Holy Frack!

This raises several questions in my mind. Keep in mind that I am the father of a future history major. I'm not disparaging sociology majors. The world needs sociologists, and historians. However, you simply can not spend $200K of borrowed money to get a sociology degree. The ROI simply is not there.

What was she thinking? I understand that she is the first person in her family to go to college. However, the fact that she borrowed all $200K implies that her family makes enough that she was not eligible for Pell Grants. So these are middle class folk that should have some financial sense.

She is from NY. There are probably 100 perfectly fine Universities in NY where she could have gotten a sociology degree for 1/2 the cost. Northeastern may be in Boston, but it is no Harvard. Harvard isn't worth Harvard money IMO.

What the heck is the school doing letting a student rack up $200K in debt chasing a sociology undergraduate degree?

I know why the banks loaned her the cash. It's risk free. The government guarantees the loans, so the banks don't care.

Is there any institution in this country that actually works? Education, health care, you name it. They are all FUBARed.