Oh, yeah, and I wanted to complain about one other glaring thing about scare stories like this. They always include living expenses in their default calculations. Those are not the costs of just tuition, fees, and textbooks. They're including housing and meals as well, which blows the numbers up quite a bit and makes it look like the costs are always completely ridiculous.
They have a toggle on the payscale results so you can see the results
without room and board, and they are totally different.
It is still possible to pay your way through school or only take out a small loan if you work part time, live with family, things like that. So look at a site like this one for Colorado schools:
Compare Schools
To get a four year degree, you can start out at a community college for just over $3000 a year tuition and fees, then transfer your credits to a four year school and finish out for around $6000 a year. And that's without financial aid.
Costs have gone up a LOT, it's true, but the costs aren't always as crazy as articles like that make it sound.