<prompt> Human: Under normal circumstances, I would never think to pull from my IRA. However, it seems to be a good option for me at the time. My goal is to be debt-free when I graduate school this coming May. Currently, I have just under 15,000 in student loans that will begin to gain interest upon graduation.In my IRA I have just over 17,000. So my options are to pull from my IRA and take the 10 tax penalty or to just gradually pay off the loan after I graduate. At the moment I am leaning more towards just taking the 10 tax penalty and starting fresh after school with no debt. Do any of you finance gurus have any suggestions for my situation?Additionally, I will also be starting grad school in May as well. I anticipate most of my tuition will be paid for with grantsscholarships. However, if I wait to pull from my IRA, I could use my IRA for any tuition that is not covered with the IRA without the tax penalty. Thanks in advance for taking the time to comment!  <response>: Thats a terrible idea. Youll pay a 10 penalty plus taxes immediately. Thats way more money lost than to any of your interest rates. The likely growth if youre in an index fund will also be better, so youre really shooting yourself in both feet. 