It was big news when outstanding student loan debt surpassed credit card debt and then later exceeded $1 trillion for the first time. That shocking statistic keeps climbing, with no sign of slowing down: Americans now have more than $1.4 trillion in unpaid education debt, according to the Federal Reserve. Meanwhile, college-bound kids and their families try to avoid going into debt by heeding advice like "save more," "apply for scholarships" or "go to a cheaper school." Of course, none of those address the major issue of rising costs that have far outpaced wage growth. It's smart to avoid student loan debt if you can, because those loans affect your credit and your financial future. (You can see how much by checking your free credit scores on Credit.com.) However, strategically choosing a school isn't quite as straightforward as comparing tuition and fees. One thing you can do is check out an institution's net price calculator, which should be on its website, to see how much a student like you would pay after grants and scholarships. Another thing you can do is look at how much student loan debt recent grads ended up with. (You can read more about options for repaying your student loans here.) Where Is Student Loan Debt the Lowest? The response to that question is a little trickier to figure out, but organizations like The Institute for College Access & Success (TICAS) have compiled such data to help. According to their Project on Student Debt, 68% of 2015 bachelor's degree recipients graduated with student loan debt. The average was $30,100 per borrower. TICAS put together their project based on student loan debt figures from the "Common Data Set," a survey of colleges used by college-guide publishers. The colleges voluntarily self report their data, which presents problems. "Colleges that accurately calculate and report each year's debt figures rightfully complain that other colleges may have students with higher average debt but fail to update their figures, under-report actual debt levels, or never re