When millennials across the United States came together in support of Bernie Sanders and his "free college", there was a major uproar.

"Why do you need free college? I had to work my way through college."

"Stop complaining, stop being so lazy and just deal with it."

"Your generation is too idealistic."

These are just a few of the common complaints that surrounded Bernie Sanders' infamous "free college" platform in the recent campaign. I am not here today to write about Bernie Sanders, however. I am not even here today to write about this idyllic notion of free college. I am here today to write about the impossible standards we have put on education today, and the pressure that these standards have put on current students.

College is expensive— more expensive than it has ever been as the data seems to show. We talk so much about the effect this has on students financially— most notoriously the crippling debt most modern students have found themselves facing— but I believe there are other, potentially more serious consequences for the modern student.

At my university, in order to graduate in four years, I have to take 15-16 credit hours per semester. This typically rounds out to be about 5 classes per semester. On top of this, I am working to pay for my car, groceries, and all other things I need to live. Between these commitments, I often find myself exhausted, stressed out, anxious, and losing sleep over assignments. It should be noted here that I do not write these things asking for any sense of sympathy, but merely to shed light on the reality for most students today; this is not just my reality, but the reality of many modern American college students. The pressures of graduating quickly to avoid tuition for another year frequently result in an amount of stress that is simply irrational. This point is demonstrated in the data of mental health diagnoses and suicidal tendencies in college students (I'll give you a hint, it has increased drastically). We're developing unhealthy lifestyles, studying ourselves out of health to get jobs we may or may not get with our degrees. For example, students often find themselves choosing between a night of sleep or a finished assignment. Students are turning to drugs like Adderall just to get everything done. The saying "your job is just to be a student!" is a thing of the past: my job is to go to school for eight hours, work a job for eight more, study for four, and sleep for, well, maybe four if the caffeine lets me. I acknowledge wholeheartedly that in this country we are privileged to be given an education in the first place, yes, but changes still need to be made. We are not lazy, we are not "snowflakes", we are running against a machine that keeps getting faster and faster and faster, and for some of us, it is quite literally killing us.

In an ideal world, there would be such a value on education that students aren't put into the position of extreme work loads to avoid financial burdens. Maybe it's lowering the cost, maybe it's making it easier to go to fewer classes at once, maybe it's something else entirely. Fundamentally, if prices of education keep going up, the more pressure will be put on students. Free college isn't what we're asking for, we're asking for affordable college. We're asking for the luxury of being able to take one less class without having to pay an extra $20,000+ to stay another year to finish. We want to sleep. We want to eat. We want to be able to achieve without it meaning we lose our sense of self, our sanity.

I have found that far too often the cries of students under these pressures go unheard. They are written off, they are compared, and they are not met with any sense of empathy. Empathy is not denying, empathy is not comparing. Empathy is listening. What we have on our hands today is an education crisis, and if we say we care about education in this country, something must be done about it. Someone needs to listen and find our concerns valid. Until that day happens, I will write, and I will advocate, and I will encourage others to do the same.