Spend Effectively To Maximize Happiness 

Agreed…

No one on here is a financial advisor really, but as a general rule of thumb, trying to do two things at once typically isn’t as effective as just focusing on one thing at a time. It’s like if you tried to become fluent in two foreign languages at the same time. Can it be done...? Technically yes, but it will be much harder and take more time than if you just did one language at a time and focused all your energy on just one. So in your scenario, it would likely be wisest to start with a very basic starter emergency fund of say $1000-$3000. Some disagree here and think you should have a full emergency fund, but that is generally counter productive to a certain point at least. Once you have that starter emergency fund in place, put the rest of your spare income into paying off your debts (minus mortgage if you have one). Do not split it 50/50. Just put 100% of the spare money into debt payoff. Once you have completed paying off your debts, then you can make a more stable emergency fund of roughly 6 months of expenses. From there it’s up to you, but putting aside systematic investments into your retirement would be a good place to start. There is more than one way to achieve solid financial habits and stability, but this is a fairly conservative and proven way. There are other ways of course too. The biggest thing is understanding your behavior and what will allow you to succeed and pay this off the fastest. Good luck!

Live in survival mode. Attack that debt as fast as you possibly can! The longer you have debt the more money you lose overall. Do nothing fun, work, eat, sleep, home, until you pay it off.

There's not much of a difference. The bigger difference is conditions at home because it either reinforces what's learned at school or it's completely dismissed.

As someone who did both throughout my school career, I would recommend finding a good public school rather than funding private