By Beatrice Dupuy and Maura Lerner

Minneapolis Star Tribune

Minnesota may still have one of the highest levels of college debt in the nation, but a new state report suggests that there may be a glimmer of hope.

Two reports released Tuesday assessed how the class of 2014 fared in student debt. On Tuesday morning, the Project on Student Debt ranked Minnesota fifth highest in the nation, with an average debt of $31,579 for graduates with bachelor’s degrees. Hours later, the Minnesota Office of Higher Education issued its own report, noting a modest decrease in student debt. Instead of an average figure used in the national study, the state reported the median debtload of $27,296, the midpoint between the highest amount of debt and the lowest.

The data suggest that there is a growing movement among students to limit the amount of college loans they take out, said Larry Pogemiller, the office’s commissioner.

“More and more people are looking at how much debt they are taking on,” he said.

At the University of Minnesota, “we’ve noticed that student debt has in fact gone down,” said Robert McMaster, vice provost and dean of undergraduate education. He says that’s partly due to a two-year tuition freeze, which began in 2013. “The tuition freeze had a huge impact” he said.

But he also credits the U’s intensive financial literacy program, which advises students how to keep costs down. “From the moment students step on campus, we’re pounding on them: ‘Don’t borrow unless you have to,” he said. “That is, I think, making a big difference as well.”

‘A major policy issue’

Nationally, 7 in 10 seniors who graduated in 2014 had student loan debt, according to the survey by the nonprofit Institute for College Access & Success, with an average of $28,950 per borrower.

Over the past decade the share of graduates with debt rose modestly from 65 percent to 69 percent, the institute’s report said. Their average debt was $28,950, up 2 percent compared with the class of 2013.