伊玛尼·里维拉一生都梦想着在时尚行业工作。然而，严峻的现实是新冠肺炎(新型冠状病毒肺炎)迫使像她这样的高中生重新评估他们接受高等教育的道路。
冠状病毒的大流行使这个17岁孩子的父母无法工作。她的母亲是优步的一名司机，她的父亲是一名维修工，两人都试图失业一个多月。
“每天早上我听到他们早上7点醒来，马上打电话给失业人员。前几天，我爸爸被搁置了三个小时，然后他们挂断了他的电话，”里维拉告诉美国广播公司新闻。“每天都是背靠背的失望，当你真的无能为力帮助家人时，这真的很令人沮丧。”
里维拉住在纽约市的房子里，将成为第一代大学生，她已经被时尚技术学院录取，这是全国顶尖的时尚学校之一，也是她从四年级开始就想上的学校。
“我已经把一切都投入其中了。我只是没想到会是这样，”她补充道。
为了防止她完全被贷款压得喘不过气来，她的父母原本计划帮助他们的女儿上金融学院，然而，现在看来，她父母的任何额外帮助都不太可能了。
“我真的对每件事都感到压力很大，”她补充道。“我该怎么办?我能去吗?”
里维拉说，如果她无法筹集到足够的资金就读，她正在考虑在经济好转时转学之前先上一所社区大学。
随着申请失业的美国人数量攀升至2600多万现在，许多中低收入学生都在想，他们的高等教育梦是否遥不可及。
鉴于多年来大学费用不断上涨，这种流行病极大地影响了他们支付教育费用的能力。
像他们的父母一样，许多曾经为大学工作和储蓄的学生现在也失业了，由于不断增加的债务和大流行而进一步瘫痪。
全国大学入学咨询协会主席杰恩·丰纳希告诉美国广播公司新闻，有“成千上万的中产阶级家庭认为他们有一个合理的计划，让他们的孩子以最低的债务上大学。”对于那些目前正在经历失业的人来说，“这个计划已经过时了，现在他们需要重新思考他们的学生如何能够继续接受大学教育，并且仍然能够安全地以负担得起的成本接受教育。”
这种不确定性也让许多父母不确定如何支付账单，同时让孩子继续上学。
“作为一个家庭，我们承受了很大的压力，”Chrisy Neff说，她住在匹兹堡，有三个女儿，其中两个在上大学。
内夫和她的丈夫拥有一家建筑公司，为了增加收入，内夫还在戴夫和巴斯特的夜间和周末工作。她和丈夫花了一个多月的时间才拿到申请失业所需的文件。
这个家庭现在的收入只有正常收入的三分之一，他们焦急地等待着国家重新开放，以便恢复建设。
“我们正在这里死去，”内夫说。“我们的积蓄已经耗尽了。”
克里斯担心帮助女儿完成大学学业。“这很难，”她说。“我们耗尽了积蓄，我们不得不支付大学学费。”
DC大学入学计划(DC-CAP)是一个帮助第一代和低收入学生完成大学学业的非营利组织，该组织的合伙人副总裁Tosha Lewis说，“我们的父母现在可能失业或因新冠肺炎而就业不足的程度，大大加剧了送学生上大学的经济压力。”
她说，除了学业负担，这些学生中的许多人还在大流行期间增加了工作时间来帮助养家。很多人也在为自己和家人的健康而焦虑。
Coronavirus erodes dreams of college for low-income students
Imani Rivera has dreamed her entire life of working in the fashion industry. However, the stark reality ofCOVID-19has forced high school students like her to reassess their path toward higher education.
The coronavirus pandemic has left the 17-year-old's parents unable to work. Her mother, an Uber driver, and her father, a maintenance worker, have both been trying for over a month to receive unemployment.
"Every morning I hear them wake up at 7 a.m., and call unemployment right away. The other day, my dad was left on hold for three hours before they hung up on him," Rivera told ABC News. "It's back-to-back disappointment every day, and it's really frustrating when there's literally nothing you can do to help your family."
Rivera, who lives in New York City housing and will be a first-generation college student, has been accepted to the Fashion Institute of Technology, one of the top fashion schools in the country and one she has wanted to attend since fourth grade.
"I have put everything into this. I just didn't really imagine it would be like this," she added.
In an effort to prevent her from being completely overwhelmed with loans, her parents had planned to help their daughter finance college, however, any additional help from her parents now seems unlikely.
"I am really stressed about everything," she added. "What am I going to do? Am I even going to be able to go?"
If she is unable to gather enough funds to attend, Rivera said she is considering attending a community college before transferring when the economy improves.
As the number of Americans filing for unemploymentclimbs to more than 26 million, many middle- and lower-income students are now wondering whether their dream of a higher education is out of reach.
Given the years of escalating college costs, the pandemic has greatly affected their ability to pay for their education.
Much like their parents, many students who had been working and saving for college are now also unemployed, further paralyzed by mounting debts and the pandemic.
Jayne Fonash, president of the National Association for College Admission Counseling, told ABC News that there are "thousands and thousands of middle class families who thought they had a reasonable plan for their child to get to college with a minimum amount of debt." For those who are currently experiencing unemployment, "that plan goes out the window and now they need to rethink how their students can pursue a college education and still be able to be safe and do it at an affordable cost."
The uncertainty has also left many parents uncertain of how they will pay bills, while keeping their children in school.
"It's taken a lot of stress on us as a family," said Chrisy Neff, who lives in Pittsburgh and has three daughters, two of whom are in college.
Neff and her husband own a construction company, and in an effort to bring in supplemental income, Neff also works at Dave and Buster's on the nights and weekends. It took over a month for her and her husband to get the paperwork necessary to file for unemployment.
The family is now making one-third of its normal income, and is anxiously awaiting for the state to reopen so that construction can resume.
"We are dying here," Neff said. "Our savings have been depleted."
Chrisy worries about helping her daughters finish college. "It's hard," she said. "We have depleted our savings, and we have college payments that we have to make."
Tosha Lewis, vice president of partnerships, DC College Access Program (DC-CAP), a nonprofit that assists first-generation and low-income students through the college process, said "the extent to which our parents may be unemployed now or underemployed as a result of COVID-19, has greatly exacerbated the financial stress of sending a student off to college."
In addition to their academic workload, she said, many of these students have picked up additional work hours to help support their families during the pandemic. A large number are also experiencing anxiety around their own personal health and that of their family members.
