Lots of college students arrive unprepared to handle their own finances, especially their long-term finances. Students at teaching-intensive institutions are more likely to work a lot of hours while they’re in school and to make decisions that prioritize their jobs over their studying.
I know that many, many students at my institution arrange their course schedules around their work hours, often putting a shift at a minimum-wage job ahead of choosing a particular course they want or need. Even worse, students will sometimes delay graduation by a semester or more because of their part-time jobs. The short-term decision to take more hours at Dunkin Donuts seems to make sense to them at the time, but the impact of delaying graduation another semester, with another semester of student loans, can be huge. And it means delaying entering the workforce by many months, too–and they’ll end up with that much less in pension or Social Security contributions (not the first worry of a college student, to be sure).
Here’s an article from the Huffington Post about students and money management.
Teaching at teaching-intensive institutions 