You can take a student loan, which charges a reasonable rate of interest and invest that money in yourself. If you're like most students, the return you get from investing in your education will far exceed the cost.

You can also take on other debts, such as credit cards, to pay for additional things that you might need or want. Avoid these debts to the extent possible. The money you spend won't generate any cash and the debts you incur will take their toll.

For example, let's say you want some nicer clothes or an occasional trip, but you don't have the funds to pay for them. If you accumulate $1000 in debts over the year using credit cards, the eventual cost of this high interest-rate debt could exceed $5,000 after ten years and $25,000 after twenty years.

And if you run up these debts each college year, the eventual costs will be four times higher. If, for example, you smoke a pack of cigarettes a day for your college career, and pay for them with a credit card, the direct costs to you could be more than $100,000 after twenty years.

If instead you avoid these debts, you will in effect earn a guaranteed return on investment of as much as 20% a year, after tax! That's the type of results which investment dreams are made on.