By the time they graduate, about two-thirds of students at four-year colleges and universities have accumulated student loans, according to the Project on Student Debt. That debt load averages $19,200 per student, and many graduates owe much more than that.

There is plenty to be done before the debt starts to come due — in about six months for most — but graduates need to act fast and think through their choices.

One is consolidating their federally backed loans. This decision should be made before July 1. That's when the government will recalculate the interest rate on variable-rate student loans. Although Congress changed the law so that Stafford loans made after July 1, 2006, are fixed at 6.8 percent, there are still plenty of variable-rate loans out there.

The variable interest rate on most federally guaranteed student loans is readjusted annually based on the final 91-day Treasury bill auction before June 1. The new rate becomes effective July 1 and could rise from the current 6.54 percent.

Under the federal consolidation program, student and parent borrowers can bundle all of their loans into one fixed-rate loan and stretch out the payments from the standard 10 years to 30 years, depending on the debt amount.

You can consolidate your federal loans only once — unless you have new loans that were not included in the original consolidation. You can no longer consolidate while you are still in school. And when you do consolidate, you lock in the weighted average of all your student loans, rounded up to the nearest eighth of a percentage point.

If you decide to consolidate to avoid a possible rate hike, you'll have to get your application in by June 30. Another reason to act fast: Graduates who consolidate their Stafford federal student loans during their grace period — the six months after graduation — are eligible for a 0.6 percent interest rate reduction.

So here's a to-do list for college graduates with debt: