Military Times EDGE

A survey by student-loan provider Sallie Mae found that undergraduate college students had an average of $3,173 in credit card debt in spring 2008, and 92 percent of undergraduates with credit cards used them to pay for textbooks and other education expenses last year.

The survey found that 84 percent of college students have at least one credit card. Within that group, 30 percent use the cards to pay for tuition, up from 24 percent in 2004. Only 17 percent of the students regularly pay off their balance each month, the survey found.

Sallie Mae described students’ balances as “record-high,” with 21 percent carrying balances from $3,000 to $7,000.