by our College Data Analytics TeamBelow is federal data on the loans students use to pay for City Colleges of Chicago-Kennedy-King College: median debt, the percentile spread, total borrowing including PLUS loans, and the cost to repay. The data below is drawn directly from federal sources.
Among first-year students at Kennedy-King College, 2% of incoming students take out a loan to help cover first-year costs, with a typical loan of $6,219 each — a figure that counts both private and federal student loans.
The average federal loan is $6,219. This reaches or tops the $5,500 first-year federal borrowing cap for a typical dependent student. Note that average undergraduate loan amounts shown later do not include private loans — so the full freshman figure above is not directly comparable.
Looking at all undergraduates at Kennedy-King College, freshmen included, 6% borrow through federal student loan programs, averaging $5,521 in federal loans per year. This is 11.2% less than the $6,219 typical freshmen borrow.
Repeating that yearly amount projects to about $11,042 in two years and roughly $22,084 over a four-year span. These figures assume identical federal borrowing each year and omit private and Parent PLUS loans.
| Undergraduate federal borrowing | Value |
|---|---|
| Share using federal loans | 6% |
| Average federal loan per year | $5,521 |
| Undergraduates with a federal loan | 93 |
| Total federal loans (one year) | $513,421 |
Graduating and withdrawing students at Kennedy-King College carry a median federal debt of $4,994 in federal student loans.
| Borrower group | Median federal debt |
|---|---|
| All federal borrowers | $4,994 |
| Students who completed (graduates) | $6,180 |
| Students who withdrew | $4,600 |
Withdrawn-student debt matters because those borrowers carry the loans without the degree that helps repay them.
Looking only at the median is misleading — these four percentiles describe the full debt distribution for borrowers at Kennedy-King College.
| Percentile | Cumulative Federal Debt |
|---|---|
| 10th percentile (lowest-debt students) | $1,750 |
| 25th percentile | $2,263 |
| 75th percentile | $8,127 |
| 90th percentile (highest-debt students) | $14,807 |
The gap between the 10th and 90th percentile is the clearest single measure of how widely borrowing varies at Kennedy-King College.
The figures above count only the students own federal loans. Adding PLUS loans (borrowed by parents or graduate students) gives a fuller picture of total borrowing at Kennedy-King College.
| Group | Borrowers | Median debt incl. PLUS |
|---|---|---|
| All borrowers | 178 | $10,773 |
| Completed (graduates) | 52 | $10,423 |
| Did not complete | 126 | $11,009 |
On a standard 10-year plan, the median completing borrower would pay about $123.94/mo.
The split below distinguishes Stafford borrowers from non-Stafford borrowers at Kennedy-King College.
Current-Year Stafford Borrowers
| Cohort | Borrowers | Median debt incl. PLUS |
|---|---|---|
| Stafford loan this year | 19 | $12,246 |
| No Stafford loan this year | 159 | $10,700 |
The indicators below describe what the typical debt costs to pay back at Kennedy-King College.
Defaulting means failing to repay a federal student loan, which carries serious credit consequences. The federal two-year cohort default rate for Kennedy-King College follows.
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| 2-year cohort default rate | 12.8% |
| Borrowers in the cohort | 591 |
This rate follows a borrower cohort from the start of repayment through the two-year window the Department of Education uses.
Borrowing varies by family income, by first-generation status, and by dependency status.
Borrowing by Income Tier
| Income tier | Median federal debt |
|---|---|
| Low income | $5,000 |
By First-Generation Status
| Cohort | Median federal debt |
|---|---|
| First-generation students | $5,000 |
| Continuing-generation students | $4,625 |
Dependent vs Independent Borrowers
| Cohort | Median federal debt |
|---|---|
| Dependent students | $3,500 |
| Independent students | $5,500 |
Federal data publishes the following gap measures for Kennedy-King College.
Subsidized vs. Unsubsidized Loans
Unsubsidized federal student loans accrue interest every month — even while you are still enrolled. Unless you pay that interest as it builds, the balance you owe at graduation can be noticeably higher than the amount you originally borrowed.
Important to Remember
Federal student loans are not discharged in bankruptcy in all but the rarest cases, and the government can withhold part of your income or tax refund if you default.
References
More about our data sources and methodologies.