rehema ellis, nbc news, stone mountain, georgia. >>> up next here tonight, two pop culture icons in the news. one from right now and one from the past. >>> the forbes 2011 celebrity power list is out. the 100 most influential, popular, and most compensated famous people. justin bieber debuts on the list at number three. at age 17, he's pulled in $53 million over the last year. oprah knocked out of first place. at number one, laida gaga, a staggering $91 million in earnings, 32 million facebook followers. 10 million twitter followers. if you don't understand the attraction, you don't understand these ga grk a fans, started out camping yesterday, that would be tuesday, outside 30 rock, for ga grk a's appearance on "snl," that would be this coming saturday week. a long week in mostly rain. >>> another celebrity under fire. public health advocates are pressuring mcdonald's to retire ronald, as in ronald mcdonald. protesters may show up at the annual meeting tomorrow to say a clown shouldn't be used to promote fast food. and a letter to that effect signed by 500 health officials appeared in

the story from our chief education correspondent, rehema ellis. ♪ >> reporter: college commencement. time of great expectations. and for many students great debt. federal student loans now add up to $800 billion, exceeding credit card debt. >> it's not cheap. >> reporter: daniel park and six other seniors at burbank high school in california are thinking about managing future expenses now. >> raise your hand if you'll be taking out a loan to pay for the cost of college. >> reporter: they all got accepted to colleges costing on average $50,000 a year. but anxious about debt, isabel navarro decided not to go to her dream school. she will attend a community college instead. >> i don't want to graduate with a bachelor's degree with $80,000 worth of debt. >> reporter: a choice kelly space wishes she had made. she graduated with $200,000 in student loans. >> that's, you know, $1,000 payments for the next 25 years, possibly more if interest rates increase. >> reporter: students are borrowing more because college tuition and fees jumped 24% while family incomes dropped nearly 2%. huge studen

nbc's rehema ellis at ground level with more on that. good evening. >> reporter: good evening, brian. on 9/11, lives changed dramatically. today, the news about osama bin laden stirred up painful memories that for many people never go away. the initial reports on that crisp fall morning were at first unclear. >> we have a breaking news story to tell you about. apparently, a plane has just crashed into the world trade center here in new york city. >> reporter: no one could have imagined what would unfold. >> it's quite terrifying. i'm in shock right now. >> reporter: after the first crash into the north tower at 8:46 a.m., word of a second plane into the south tower at 9:03 a.m., and the horrifying picture started to emerge. >> you have to move from talking about a possible accident to talk about something deliberate that has happened here. >> reporter: then unbelievably, a third plane, this one crashed into the pentagon at 9:37 a.m. >> people here in the building are already describing it as a highly sophist quated, coordinated attack. >

nbc's rehema ellis went there today to gauge reaction to this news. >> reporter: middletown, new jersey is the kind of place people move to to escape trouble. but on september 11th this town of 66,000, an hour from ground zero, was hit hard. 37 middletown residents died in the world trade towers, including mary lou byrd's nephew, brendan, who was visiting one tower, and her oldest sister rosanne, who was working in the other. >> she would have been 52 on april 27th. >> reporter: with the news of osama bin laden's death, she says, there was a range of emotions. >> i was in disbelief. it was a little shocking, and it just brought everything back. >> reporter: in middletown even the train station can be a reminder of those who were lost that day. dozens of commuters' cars whose drivers would never return. when i was here in 2001, this local church suffered an almost unimaginable tragedy. st. mary's church alone lost 26 parishioners in one day. that's more people than the whole town lost in world war ii and vietnam combined. today this garden and memorial is another reminder of middletown's