Susan "Suze" Lynn Orman (born June 5, 1951) is an American financial advisor, author, motivational speaker, and television host.^[2]

The Money Class: Learn to Create Your New American Dream 

by Suze Orman (Mar 8, 2011)

She is the host of The Suze Orman Show on CNBC. She has written seven consecutive New York Times Best Sellers; has written, co-produced, and hosted six PBS specials based on her books; and is the most successful fundraiser in the history of public television.^[3] Periodic guest appearances on the QVChome shopping network, also place her as their top seller.^[4]

Her 2004 and 2006 PBS specials garnered daytime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Service Show Host. Orman has won more Gracie Awards than any other person.^[5]

In July 2009 Forbes named Orman 18th on their list of The Most Influential Women In Media. In May 2009 Orman was presented with an honorary degree Doctor of Humane Letters from the University of Illinois. In 2009 & 2008, she was selected by Time magazine as one of the TIME 100, The World's Most Influential People. In 2009 she was honored by Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) with theVito Russo Media Award. In April 2008 Orman was presented with the Amelia Earhart Award for her message of financial empowerment for women and Saturday Night Live spoofed Suze three times during 2008. Orman delivered the Commencement address and received an honorary degree at Bentley University on May 15, 2010.

http://www.suzeorman.com/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZlN7fmjXPyU&feature=related

Online Resources link:

http://www.cashcourse.org/shsu/Default.aspx

Read:

40 MONEY Management Tips Every College Student Should Know

http://www.smartaboutmoney.org/portals/1/resourcecenter/40moneytips07.pdf  

April 15, 2013

'I Fully Expect to Die With This Debt'

Baby boomers who went back for graduate degrees struggle to pay back their student loans 

Joan Roberts, 63, who holds two master's degrees, spent eight years in a Ph.D. program at Columbia U. but did not receive a doctorate. She has since defaulted on more than $190,000 in federal and private loans. 

student-loan debt is growing fastest among adults ages 60 and older, with more than two million people in that age group now owing an average of $19,000, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Their default rates are rising, too, and increasing numbers of retirees are seeing their Social Security checks garnished because they fell behind on student-loan payments.

Many of these older borrowers thought they could increase their marketability by earning an advanced degree later in life but are struggling to make ends meet instead. The number of people over age 50 enrolling in graduate schools more than doubled over the two decades between 1987 and 2007, when more than 182,000 enrolled, according to data from a survey published every 10 years by the U.S. Department of Education. The total amount of outstanding student-loan debt among this age group reached $155-billion in 2012.

Delinquency rates among older borrowers have grown, from about 6 percent in 2004 to more than 12 percent last year, according to the Federal Reserve.

Joan Roberts is one of those people who took a gamble on graduate school and lost.

It has been six years since Ms. Roberts, a 63-year-old divorced mother of two and former art teacher, defaulted on more than $190,000 in federal and private loans she took out for graduate school. The unpaid principal plus accrued interest and collection costs now total just over $267,000.

"I went to grad school in order to support my family and myself better," she says. "I was married, to quite a wealthy man at the time, and was also building my reputation as an artist. I panicked when my marriage broke up and I had an infant and small daughter. I started pursuing degrees."

In 1998, at age 48 with two master's degrees, Ms. Roberts enrolled in a Ph.D. program in art education at Columbia University's Teachers College with hopes of becoming a professor. Though her transcripts say she was an A student, in e-mails and progress reports from 2006, her faculty mentors say her work didn't measure up and they could no longer help her.

Ms. Roberts says she wishes her faculty advisers had told her years earlier that she wasn't going to cut it in the program instead of allowing her to continue on, and continue to rack up debt, for eight years.

"I couldn't afford to waste that kind of time or money," she says.

Ms. Roberts was told in October of 2006 that she would not be allowed to continue in her doctoral program after she refused to revise two pre-dissertation papers within three months, a time frame she considered unreasonable. She wrote letters of appeal to the graduate dean, provost, and university president. They all stood by her department's decision.

She filed for bankruptcy, hoping her debt would vanish. That didn't work; under federal law, it is almost impossible to discharge student loans through bankruptcy.

Ms. Roberts still has no Ph.D.—and no job. She lives in subsidized housing in New York City and gets by on $175 per month in food stamps. She sometimes earns a little money by selling her paintings and teaching private art lessons to schoolchildren. Adding to her troubles, the Department of Education has threatened to have her monthly Social Security checks garnished.

"I may never get relief," she says, "and I cannot plan for my future."

As default rates rise among older borrowers, a growing number are losing part of their Social Security benefits to pay off their loan debt. Data from the Treasury Department's Financial Management Service show a sharp increase in the number of retirees who had at least one Social Security payment reduced because they fell behind on student loans. There were only six such cases in 2000; last year there were 119,000.

Garnishments have steadily increased since 2005, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the government could take up to 15 percent of senior citizens' Social Security payments to collect on student loans.

"In this economic climate," she says, "I don't think going to graduate school is worth it."