Adobe is charging me 189% of what I paid for the month just to cancel my plan.

The cancellation fee is not "189% of what you paid for the current month" like you stated, but it's "50% of what you would have paid in the remaining months of your current one-year subscription term." If that cancellation fee is really $31.98, then you must have used the subscription for nine months (based on the current pricing of $19.95/month, not $16.95/month like you stated), not one month. The sales tax is included within the cancellation fee.

If you used the program for only one month, then you must have had the subscription active for more than eight months without using the program at all for most of that time. And Adobe charges subscribers the regular charge just to even have a subscription active, even if none of the programs are used at all during that time.

Maybe I'm missing something.  An annual Creative Cloud All Apps plan = 12 months.  Student rate USD $20/month x 12 months = $240

Cancelling before the 12th month and after 14 day grace period incurs a 50% early cancellation fee.  In your case, that would be approx USD $110.

For questions, phone customer service M-F during normal business hours.
https://helpx.adobe.com/contact/phone.html

Subscription & Cancellation Terms:
https://www.adobe.com/legal/subscription-terms.html

Up until a couple of weeks ago, Adobe expected you to click the link on the Payment page to read the subscription terms, where it is clearly spelled out that a cancellation fee will be charged if you cancel the subscription before the last month of the subscription. Those terms are always linked to on the page where you enter you payment information. 

Now that information is available on the Payment page itself.

Your student plan would be for a year, paid monthly. That is your contact obligation. I can't figure out how your cancellation fee was so very low. 

Hello @Pivot5E2E,
Sorry to hear that you are facing trouble. Unfortunately, you won't find the help you need at these forums. These are peer to peer forums, with no one here having access to your account information. You need to contact support.
Login to your account and navigate to the URL below. Make sure that the browser has cookies enabled, and all script blockers are disabled.
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-Manan