Across the United States, as many as 44.7 million people are burdened with federal student loan debt. Student debt has skyrocketed nationwide over the past decade, climbing to $1.46 trillion in 2018, according to a report issued that year by the New York Federal Consumer Credit Panel, and it continues to rise, outpacing credit card and auto debt.

While much discussion and government action has centered on the exploitative practices of for-profit colleges, general calls to cancel student debt are now part of the mainstream political conversation. Two leading candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination, senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, have made student debt relief a foundational part of their campaign platforms and introduced accompanying legislation in Congress to eliminate all or the majority of student debt. Most recently, Warren’s campaign pledged her plan would bypass Congress and use existing measures in the Higher Education Act.

Now the Debt Collective, an organization founded in the wake of Occupy Wall Street to offer debtors avenues to dispute their debt or have it abolished, is looking to harness the power of the nation’s student loan debtors for collective action.

About one-third of all adults age 18-29 have student debt, and that number increases 49% in that age group among adults with a bachelor’s degree or higher, according to a recent analysis of the Federal Reserve Board’s 2018 Survey of Household Economics and Decisionmaking, done by the Pew Research Center. Averages vary state-by-state, but a 2018 report from the Institute for College Access & Success found that the average U.S. student left college with $29,200 in debt. That same year, 65% of college seniors graduating from public and private nonprofit colleges and universities did so with student loan debt.

These sums take a real toll on the choices available to young people. As of 2019, an estimated 5.5 million borrowers were in default on their federal student loans, 3.6 million had loans in deferment, and another 2.8 million had loans in forbearance, which grants borrowers a temporary postponement. Some borrowers have been unable to pay because doing so would present a financial hardship that would prohibit them from meeting basic living expenses. Many young people are delaying some of the traditional rites of passage into adulthood, such as buying a home, getting married or having children, and experiencing increased feelings of stress, shame, and anxiety.

The Debt Collective wants to show them that they are not alone.

On February 7, Debt Collective will launch a nationwide student debt strike on the University of California at Los Angeles campus, calling on student debtors to formalize their deferrals into a strike against student loans. The event will highlight how some people currently paying off their student loans may eventually need to stop because of the financial hardship caused by repayments, and invite those without student loans, including high school students, to join in solidarity with the strikers.

As the country waits to see what 2020 will bring, five members of the Debt Collective tell Teen Vogue why the time is now to end student debt, once and for all.

Sandy Nurse, student debt striker and candidate for New York City Council:

"It is an insane amount of debt that people are in, and it's not like they're in it because they're out there buying hot-rod cars.... They're just trying to learn how to advance in society...[and] to have some opportunity to do better. And people are going into debt for that, and...they're shackled by it.