Chelsea Jia Feng/Insider
When Brianne Jones graduated from Eastern Michigan University in 2013, she was overjoyed to have a college degree — despite her daunting $42,000 debt load.
Jones figured if she worked hard and kept up with her payments, she would eventually be free of the financial burden. But after 10 years of consistent payments, she's still stuck with her debt, and it has actually grown — up to $57,000.
She and her twin brother were first-generation college students, so the complexities of financial aid were foreign to their family. When they maxed out on the federal aid the government would give them, they turned to the private student-loan industry to complete their degrees. And that's when the real trouble began.