Then @michaeluwill get out your checkbook and pay for this kid to go to Williams. Unless you are willing to pay the bills, it is irresponsible to suggest someone else assume this kind of debt.
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Letâs dispense with the side-eye, please
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We think differently. I think if an upper middle class family is willing to pay $20k cash per year for their sonâs college, his educational pursuits can be reached - Rutgers, Williams, wherever. Many kids would dream of $20k per year.
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- did you run the NPC before you applied?
ED I suppose, which your parents signed? - concretely, whatâs your parentsâ income?
Keep in mind theyâre SUPPOSED to use some of their savings or investments, not wipe them out and NOT retirement but some - were you aware that your parentsâ limit was 20k?
- are you saying your parents can pay 18k from income? If you add a part time job starting now (perhaps not possible due to the pandemic) you can hope to earn 3k by next summer and 3k over the summer of working full time. Add 5.5k freshman loan and you have enough to live on campus at Rutgers.
- Since you were admitted to Williamâs I assume you were admitted to the Honors College. Correct?
- Where else have you applied? Hopefully a few Williams-like colleges that offer merit aid. If not, itâs getting late, but people on this thread can help you.
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Totally agree. Many of those who planned to work on Wall St or in IB end up working in the back office to start with. And as someone mentioned upthread, a 90K job means many people will be vying for it ( and some will have connections and experience).
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@michaeluwill People value education differently. We were willing to do whatever it took to educate our kids. Some people decide to pay for college. I have a middle-income SIL who took out mortgages so her kids wouldnât have college debt, some take on second jobs and some donât do any of the above.
Iâve seen the idea on CC previously, that some folks despise debt and are shocked at the price tag of college for their kids. They canât imagine that THEIR savings would go to pay for college. They actually think itâs logical that the college would give money to a family before the family spends its savings. While others start saving at birth and plan to use all the money for college. All can affect a kid.
IMO, the parents really need to have a heart to heart and decide to either kick in a bit more say 25 so the kid will have less debt or decide with their kid to send him/her to Rutgers. Since they already have kids at Rutgers there may be a perceived equity issue with one kid attending a more expensive school. Perhaps, they want the kid to take on the debt since the cost of Williams is far more than Rutgers.
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This is to all. Again, a mystery why the system flagged it to one poster.
âI sat down with my dad and we looked through all our expenses in the last year and we calculated that after we pay the minimum for college, and that being 18k at rutgers, we still dive deep into my parents savings.â
We donât know their income, what sort of savings, whether itâs retirement/their own future stability.
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I think if you quote someone the system automatically notifies the poster.
That sounds like a big future problem. Reread post #17 of this thread. Basically, if you take on the extra debt, you will be forced to look for the highest pay all the time to pay down the debt and help your parents out in their retirement. This limits your options in case you decide that a somewhat lower paid career path is more to your liking.
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I hope he ignores you and goes for it. He deserves the opportunity to dream.
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And the original poster will be forced to take the short term highest pay. There are some cases where very good internships or short term jobs are available straight after graduation where the short term job is not high paying but provides very good experience. I will admit that the one that comes to mind right now is in a different field altogether.
One thing that concerns me is that high paying jobs are high paying for a reason. One thing that often comes with a high paying job is stress, long work hours, and working conditions that are not necessarily compatible with a pleasant life. Of course different people will have different opinions regarding what they want to do with their lives and what trade offs they want to make. When I was deciding which university to attend I was too young to know which trade off I was going to prefer.
Taking on $100,000 in debt for a bachelorâs degree strikes me as a risky investment. If everything goes right this can work out very well.
However, none of us have a perfect ability to predict what the economic and job situation will be in four years. For example I have a daughter who graduates in May. Right now it looks like she is going to be graduating into a recession and tight job market. I am really glad that she is not graduating with $100,000 in debt (she is too).
I might be a little bit biased here in that the people that I have worked with who were Rutgers graduates happened to be individuals who gave Rutgers a good name. One was a boss who had MIT and Stanford graduates working for him.
I understand the appeal of Williams. In fact I ran the NPC on Williams a few years back on behalf of a daughter who wanted a small school. It looked too expensive for us also.
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Hello everyone. I felt like I should clear more things up for all of you yelling at each other. To everyone that was wondering, EFC is $46k and my parents gross income is on the mid to high side of what comes up on google when you search middle class income in New Jersey (idk if ppl usually share their incomes. As you can tell, I am very new to these college/work forums). My parents have savings and investments that can pay for Williams fully, but at the cost of my parents quality of life dropping because they will lose a huge portion of it. Both my parents are coming close to retirement and I want both of them to be able to stay financially stable and comfortable until I make enough money to take care of them.
It seems like there are 2 main points here that everyone is bringing up. Thereâs the first choice to go to Williams, take the loan, and itâll pay off in the end. And then there is the next where itâs safest to go to Rutgers because you donât know the job market. It may not even be worth it in the end to pay that much for a similar chance of my dreams at Rutgers. I will be honest, my heart is with Williams but my brain acknowledges that it will be safest to go to Rutgers. Iâll have 100x more fun at Williams but Rutgers leaves my parents comfortable which means a lot.
I love you @michaeluwill for all the help and this fighting that youâve been doing here has certainly made by day. But to everyone arguing, thereâs no way to tell which is the right answer because so many things come along the way that factor into my future that we canât account for. I may somehow fail out of Williams or I may somehow go to Rutgers and become a drug addict and lazy piece of garbage. God knows where Iâll be at in 6 years but I will try my best to do as much as I can to set myself up for a good future.
Take this message as a conclusion to my post. I have absolutely loved looking every hour to see what people have said and I truly apologize for not answering all the questions you guys asked. All in all, I have seen both sides of this question that has been stacked against me since the financial aid report came out. I have just until 1/11 to make my decision so in these upcoming days I will look at all the advice countless times over. If anyone wants more clarification of my scenario, ask away as I will be happy to share whatever. For those that want to continue fighting, be my guest as I have truly enjoyed reading the messages. But that is all I need. Thank you all for contributing and putting in your 2 cents (or in michaels case his 28 cents). It has truly been able to help me in a huge way and I am sure to come here if I have any more questions. The rest is up to me to think deeply about and I think itâs your turns to go share your wisdom with other kids that need it.
Best Regards,
StrugglingRunner
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You got this! Either way, you will win. Thanks for the kind words.
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Ok, I see why you were admitted to Williams:-). You will go far, whatever school you attend. Best of luck to you!
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Maybe Iâm missing something but it sounds like you EDâd to Williams? Correct and now wondering if the cost is worth it? 46K a year EFC? equals 184K that you and your family have to come up with. I say âNoâ!
The die was cast when your family did not save for your future college, which is fine but the family has to live with the consequences of choosing to spend their money in different ways.
Not the end of the world to attend Rutgers, but I would NOT live at home. Take out the Stafford loans and work in the summers to pay for room and board if at all possible. A residential college experience is part of the college âeducationâ, at least get that if you are going to Rutgers.
Are you giving up an excellent education from Williams, absolutely, but you sound like a kid that will do well wherever you end up. Good luck to youâŠ
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You certainly strike me as a person very mature for your age, also in matters that are abstract to most HS seniors, like parentsâ retirement security. Good luck, whatever you decide youâll be fine, itâs just a choice between the more âheroicâ and the more âestablishmentâ version of the American dream, apologies for the cliche.
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I think youâll be a much bigger help to your parents in their old age, if you are actually able to take the time off to visit them.
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Upper middle class income in New Jersey, siblings collectively will be well past the half-way point of college expenses by the time OP starts at Williams. IB aspirations, $100k debt, I say go for it.
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iâm sorry, but no. no, no, n o. you are eighteen years old. taking out $100K in loans by the time you graduate college and wanting to pursue a masterâs on top of that (which are typically funded very little and are most of the time not funded at all) is, quite frankly, a one-way ticket to a miserable life.
even if you are able to secure an extremely well-paying job after undergrad (should you decide not to pursue that masterâs), thatâs still $100K you couldâve had that you will now be obligated to pay back. i also go to a well-regarded LAC (a peer school, according to williams), and i croaked at the realization that iâll be slightly above only $10K in debt when i graduate. i do not think itâs worth it at all.
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On average Williams grads pay down debt at very high rates which is an indicator of the higher average earnings for top tier LACs and Ivies.