The high cost of graduation

Your final semester as an undergrad student is perhaps the most nerve-wracking four and a half months of your life. The pressure is on to finish your convos (only 14 more to go!), complete your most significant work in college and find a job before your student loans come back to haunt you.

In two months and 20 days, I will leave Belmont University with a diploma and $27,958 in debt in an uncertain economy where even the most qualified people aren’t finding work. So why am I still being aggressively targeted by companies that prey on sentimentality?

Let me back up.

A couple of weeks ago, I grabbed the mail; beneath a stack of bills, junk mail and a James Bond movie from Netflix, I discovered a letter addressed to me from Belmont. But when I opened the envelope, I discovered that the letter was actually from Jostens, vendor of high school and college memorabilia, advising me on graduation packages.

Since then I’ve been inundated with opportunities to spend cash to commemorate my impending graduation. The “basic package” would run me $80 for 25 personalized announcements, 25 note cards, 30 return address labels and 25 custom envelope seals. Effectively, I would be paying $80 to tell 25 people that I’m graduating, in a thinly veiled request for a handout. The packages get more elaborate from there, topping out at $171.85, which piles on announcement inserts, a diploma frame and a certificate of appreciation for good measure.

Putting aside the high cost for a moment, is any of this really necessary? Like it or not, most of my family is on Facebook. With a single status update, I can tell everyone what’s happening. If I missed anyone, then there’s always e-mail. Or telephone. Or carrier pigeon. My point is that I have options and all of them have a more personal touch than the generic postcards I’m being offered for a fair sum of money.

Maybe it’s because I come from a family where practicality is king or maybe it’s because I’m uncomfortable putting the spotlight on myself — no need to point out the irony of writing an editorial, I’m way ahead of you — but I can’t see any situation where I would spend money to celebrate myself. I don’t mean to diminish the milestone; it’s an undeniably important part of all students’ lives, but I honestly don’t understand how the ritual suggested by Jostens on their own Web site honors the achievement any more than the alternative.

But that’s only the beginning. Belmont’s graduation checklist includes the option to purchase a class ring for the low starting price of $371, and the graduation packet given out to seniors includes an advertisement for a photographer shooting at commencement. Not to throw a fellow photog under the bus, but are shots from a point-and-shoot camera any less significant than what amounts to a highly staged yearbook photo?

It’s probably not going to win me any swag from distant family members and it may earn me a reputation as a graduation Scrooge, but I’ll be much more comfortable blowing off the attempts to squeeze a little more money out of my college career. I’m sure my bank account will be thrilled too.