Help me prepare for grad school!

[BreathinStephen]

Hey, so I知 fairly new here at MMM and am excited to try to be more practical and responsible with my precious money.  Right now I知 $30,000 in debt from student loans from my Bachelors (Sociology/Math) and working a job where I take home $1400 a month.  I have practically no savings. My partner and I are getting a roommate to make our rent cheaper and I知 going to start walking/biking to work and cutting back a lot on luxuries.  After the new roommate our rent and utilities will come out around $350/month.  I知 hoping I can put $850/month towards paying off my debt and building a small savings.  We値l see how this goes.  In general I have a hard time following through with my big ideas, but every day is a new day and, hey, optimism right?

Anyway, I really want to return to school to become an Occupational Therapist.  The master programs range anywhere from 20K-100K and the average salary of an OT  is 60K.  I知 almost 28 and I would like to start raising a family at around 35, and the programs are two years, so I hope to apply for programs in 3 or 4 years. 

Taking on more debt seems very anti-Stache, but I will realistically have to take on some.  Becoming an OT isn稚 about the money; it痴 what I really want to do.  I would appreciate any advice on how to prepare financially for going back to school.  Thanks!

[beltim]

If you would be making 3-4 times your salary after your training, why would you wait?  Why trade 4 years of $5000/month salary for 4 years of $1400/month salary?

[BreathinStephen]

I should have mentioned, I am taking prerequisites now!  I will be done with them spring semester next year.  I will take the following summer to prepare for the GREs and apply for the 2016 Fall semester.

[Tempe]

Good luck! I want to go to school to do the same, but frustratingly can't take the occupational assistant program because the campus is too far away.  If you don't go for the 100k masters program becoming an OT would be a good idea. The I guesstimated the costs for the masters near me to be 40k, which is doable since I could work part time (I just can't get in the OTA program before it.)
(on a side note, apparently chrome spellcheck thinks guesstimated is fine as a word)

[AlanStache]

I might be more careful than some here about paying down debt while in school, you never know what will come up and having a larger cash reserve might be handy vs putting something unexpected on the credit card.  Once money is paid towards student loans you cant get it back. 

But if your partner is secure in there job and you two have talked all this out then maybe it is good to pay it down.  Just run over the what if's before hand.

Also if you are in school will you still be charged interest on your loans or only are you not required to make payments?  Perhaps only cover the interest while in school?