Using data from the 2018 National Financial Capability Study, we use a series of logistic regressions to isolate the relationship between on-time student loan repayment and demographic and economic variables, as well as the impact of financial behavior, financial knowledge, and financial education. We find that older borrowers, male borrowers, non-white borrowers, and borrowers with children are less likely to make timely student loan payments. When it comes to behavior, earning a degree and subsequently earning more income are essential to successful loan payback. Financial knowledge and sustainable financial behaviors are also important predictors of on-time student loan repayment. However, financial education seems to have no impact. We argue that bounded rationality describes the process of many student loan decisions. While formal financial education can communicate the behaviors that are likely to result in successful student loan repayment, many young borrowers can’t engage in successful cost benefit analysis because they don’t know enough about their future academic and professional prospects. As a result, they choose student loan strategies that suffice based on limited analysis with the primary goal to simply make it to college. We conclude that nudges are likely to be more effective in guiding students to successful student loan strategies than traditional education models that assume the average student is self-aware and has the cognitive power to consider the many variables that will influence what their lives will look like in the years after they matriculate